kale's The Bond Unbreakable: The Taiora Saga
by Eowyn the Fair
Summary: Book 2. Taichi Kamiya, broken by his encounter with Piedmon's spirit, is offered safety and a return to prominence with a new group of chosen children. But only if he agrees to renounce all that he holds most dear...
1. Chapter I

Notes: For those who missed the disclaimer for book one, yes, I do have kale's permission to post these. See his author profile #12224 if you don't believe me. And yes, the title of this story was changed when he rewrote it as the private edition. But it is the same story that was book #2 last time.

Of course, this is the second book. If you haven't read the first one, Soulbound the Takari saga, you may be a little lost here.

****

Tai Kamiya sat alone in his bedroom, his back against the door and his knees pulled up to his chest while staring blankly at some nondescript point on the wall in front of him. And but for a minor, almost imperceptible palsy, he had remained completely motionless, in that same position, for nearly two solid hours. The look on his face was a tortured one, and the sweat that beaded on his forehead could not have come from the mild temperature in the building.

For most of the past month he had remained in the same dazed state, forcing more customary behavior only when it appeared that his parents would become so alarmed as to seek medical advice about him. He had steadfastly refused contact with anyone else, and had pulled thick, dark curtains over his bedroom windows so that not even sunlight could intrude upon him. Now the cool, suffocating darkness in the room enfolded him, drowning him, and he prayed that there, in bleak solitude, he might find some absolution for what had happened.

__

He couldn't believe what he'd done... or worse, what he'd almost done.

But despite the heavy penance he had taken up and the continual emotional torment that he was subjecting himself to, forgiveness would not come. Behind his closed eyes he could still see Matt, bound in heavy ropes, writhing angrily at his feet and staring daggers up at him. And in his mind he could experience for himself the same sharp kick to the ribs that Matt had received for looking at him so.

Mimi was still crying frantically, her ruined mascara dribbling messily off of her cheeks in a flood of tears.

Izzy and Sora. They had clearly given up, Izzy with a look of incredulous betrayal in his eyes. At the very least, the pair were no longer struggling against their bonds. Joe? Surprisingly, the older boy had put up the best fight of all of them at the beginning. But a few well-aimed blows to the face had set his nose to bleeding and put an end to his struggle quickly enough.

Only Matt still fought back, but fought back in vain, as surely he knew.

He had turned his back on them all. He'd won, as he knew he would. Cursed, damned victory. Soon Kari and T.K. would arrive as well, and he would bring an end to all of this. They would each die, one at a time, at his hands. In the mind within his mind, he could see how it would all unfold. It would be all too easy...

The repulsion of their imagined deaths shocked Tai violently back to the present and the veiling darkness of his room. "_Why?_"he demanded of himself, closing his eyes against tears of anger and frustration and pounding his fist into the side of his bed. "Why couldn't I have been stronger?"

It had been just over a month since that had all happened. The spirit of the Dark Master Piedmon had taken up residence in Tai's consciousness on their last day in the digital world when he had foolishly tried to take the creature's sword as a memento for himself. Though the boy had not known it at the time, the weapon had served as some sort of beacon for the other and had allowed Piedmon's soul to find its way back from the place where T.K. and Angemon had banished it. And after taking control of Tai's body and much of his consciousness, the other's lifeforce had lain dormant for those three years until it was strong enough to rise up and seize total control.

"Tai?" his mother called, gently tapping on the door at his back. "Telephone. It's your friend, Matt."

The boy exhaled deeply, running his fingers though his messy hair. He'd _begged _them all to leave him alone. He just couldn't bring himself to face them after what he'd done to them... and the infinitely more ghastly horror of what he would have done if it hadn't been for the love of Kari and the courage of little T.K. _Why couldn't they just leave him alone...?_

Tai picked up the receiver and held it to his ear, waiting to hear his mother hang up the other line. After a clearly audible click had told him that she'd done so, the boy answered. "Matt," he murmured, his voice husky and dry and full of shame. He'd failed them all, and didn't think that he could ever face them again without reliving the full horror of what had happened to him.

"Tai, where were you?" the other demanded accusingly, almost angrily. "It broke Mimi's heart, her having to leave without getting the chance to say goodbye to all of us together. You know how important it was to her to see us before she left." He paused, waiting for a response. When none was forthcoming, he continued. "Tai, you won't see her again for months! How could you do that to her?"

Tai's voice was dark. "I couldn't do it, Matt. I just don't want her... want any of you to see me like this."

Matt checked a sigh on the other end of the phone, biting his lip to keep from blurting out something that he really shouldn't. "Tai... c'mon buddy, snap out of it. You know you can't keep beating yourself up with this forever. Sooner or later you're going to have to come out of that room and talk to us, and see that each and every one of us has already forgiven you a hundred times over. Hell, I don't even know what there is left to forgive. We've all been through worse."

"Matt," Tai responded calmly and with deadly seriousness. "I came this close to killing _every_... _single_... _one of you_. I came closer than that to killing your brother and m... my own sister. I almost caused our world to get invaded by an army twice as large as anything that Myotismon ever put together, and--"

"Damn it, Tai it wasn't you!" Matt very nearly shouted, frustrated by the despondency in Tai's voice. "You know that and so do the rest of us. Sure, we all got scared, and T.K. and Kari got a little scraped up, but you saved T.K.'s life by holding out against Piedmon during that little fight that you two had. _You _saved his life, Tai, and he saved Kari's. You've got to know that."

It was the only consolation that Tai had allowed himself. He had been strong enough to exert just enough control over his own body so that the master swordsman had not been able to kill T.K during their duel, as he certainly would have done otherwise. But even as the noble thought tried to buoy his feelings he pushed it back down again, sincere in his determination to punish himself for what he'd done. "Mimi'll get over it," he said, reverting back and ending the previous conversation.

"Tai--"

"Matt, I don't want to talk about it. Just... not right now," the boy sighed, and slowly placed the receiver back on the hook.

Matt, left holding a dead line, sighed in discouragement. Despite a month of trying, none of them had been able to talk Tai out of his self-induced depression. They had each gone to great measures to communicate their forgiveness to him, but it was all in vain. Tai was intent on torturing himself for what he'd done, and was now little more than a shell of his former self.

The blond-haired boy felt a sense of exasperation welling up inside him, and longed for someone to talk to. He was perfectly willing to acknowledge his shortcomings, and providing needed solace to a friend who refused to listen was _definitely _such a shortcoming. He needed Sora. If anyone could break through to Tai, he was sure that it would be her. But Sora was out with T.K. and Kari, acting as chaperone for the pair.

Matt's brow furrowed, honestly not sure how that made him feel. Sure, he supposed that he was happy that the two were 'official' as Mimi would have put it... but still, they _were _only eleven years old.

Suddenly the door to the apartment flew open. "Hey, Matt!" hailed a female voice from behind him, as if summoned by his need.

"Sora," the boy nodded, exhaling in relief. At the girl's back T.K. and Kari also entered, the pair still hand in hand. During the time of Kari's illness, her contact with T.K. had been necessary... more or less the only thing that had kept her alive, but now that she was better neither of the two seemed inclined to break off the contact. The shy little glances that the two kept directing at each other were heartwarming, and Matt's concern about them suddenly seemed wrong and out of place. When he saw them together, everything about it just seemed so right.

He shook his head. There was a more important matter to attend to at the moment. "Sora, will you please try to talk to--"

"Wait a minute, Matt," T.K. interrupted, smiling. "Sora's got it all figured out."

Matt turned on his little brother, a single eyebrow raised to silence him. "Well that's nothing new, squirt," he countered. "As I recall, she had the two of you 'figured out' a few weeks before anyone bothered to tell the rest of us. At least until I caught you in bed together."

Both of the younger pair blushed at the words and cast a quick, fond glance at one another. Matt and the others all knew the reason for that now, but they still endured no end of teasing about it.

"Matt, please listen to her," Kari implored. Matt softened his stance at the younger girl's voice plea. He now looked on her as every bit a sister as he did T.K. a brother, especially since her own older brother had become little better than a recluse.

The older blond boy turned to Sora and sighed. He acknowledged her as the wisest of them all, perhaps outside of the youngest two. It was hard to tell with them. "Tell me it's about Tai."

"Okay. It's about Tai." She smiled and paused for effect, then continued. "You see, my dad is going to take me on a little trip up to the mountains this weekend, and he kind of hinted that I should bring along as many of you as wanted to come. Though I think that's just so I'll stay out of his way while he's communing with the fish."

Matt waited for her to continue. When she didn't, only sat there smiling at him, the expectant look on his face faltered. "What... that's it? A _camping_ trip?Sora, Tai won't come out of his room to go eat or talk or even _see _any of us. What makes you think he'd agree to go on a camping trip?"

Sora grinned. "You haven't heard where we're going yet."

Matt's protests stopped in mid-breath, recognition dawning on his face. His teeth wrapped around his bottom lip for a moment. "What about the other kids up there?"

"Summer camp is over, just this week. When the all the campers are gone, they're going to open it up to the public."

Matt looked hopeful for a moment, then frowned again. "I don't know what good it'll do. The gate to the digital world isn't going to open again just because we show up. Even if it did, I don't know if it'll help him any."

"Matt this isn't about getting him back to the digital world. It's about taking Tai back to a place where he first found out that he was destined to be something more than ordinary. That camp is special to all of us, tough guy, even you."

The older boy stopped and focused on her. He had begun to have stirrings of emotion of… of some sort for Sora, and whatever she said usually made sense to him when she first said it. But he refused to give in to the temptation to automatically agree and instead put his mind to work. He sincerely doubted that Tai would agree to go, but decided after a moment that it wouldn't hurt to ask.

"All right," he said, his response slow and measured. "I'll ask my dad for me and T.K. But it'll have to be someone else that convinces Tai to come. I'd get more out of talking to a stick."

Sora and Kari glanced at each other, a conspiratorial smile passing between the pair. "Leave that to us."

*****

Tai sat alone in the very back of the van, looking petulant to say the least. In the end he had agreed to come, but was making his displeasure felt by doing everything as moodily as possible. He crossed his arms and exhaled loudly, in case either of the girls had forgotten how upset he was with them. _Don't even know why I let those two talk me into this…_

Kari and Sora sat in the middle, on either side of T.K., and winked. Between the two of them, there had been enough badgering and pleading and crying over the past few days to break down even the most stubborn resistance. Tai had continued to sulk the entire time and mutter that all he wanted to do was sit in his room and be left alone, but in the end even he had been no match for the two of them together.

The gray mountain loomed at his side as he turned his head, and he frowned as he placed his forehead against the window. _This is where I was chosen because I was brave. This is where I became their leader. This is where everything started to fall apart... Oh, Agumon, buddy, where are you now? I'm so afraid... so afraid..._

It was a long drive, much longer than Tai remembered, and he had become considerably more moody by the time that they arrived at the campsite. Sora's father allowed them to select their own site and to pitch their own tents with one provision: it must be within sight of his. He would be up early and fishing most of the time, but he made them swear to keep up with him constantly.

The children selected their campsite and quickly started to set up two tents and their gear. Mimi, of course, had already left the country. Izzy had declined the invitation and Joe was still busy studying for summer school. That left Kari and Sora in one tent and Tai, Matt and T.K. in the other. 

"Dad says that we have to be careful up here," Sora said, joining Matt and Tai from checking in with her father. "He says that last year some kids from a home for troubled children disappeared in this area, so he doesn't want us wandering off anywhere."

"Well you can tell him he doesn't have to worry about me, at least," Tai answered sullenly, not meeting her eyes. "If the rest of you don't mind, I'll just stay here in the tent for a while."

"Oh no you won't," Sora retorted firmly, hands on her hips as she turned on him. "We're _supposed _to stay together, remember? And the rest of us have decided that we're going to take a hike down to the lake for a while."

__

"Swimming?" the other returned dubiously. "Isn't it kind of cold up here for swimming?"

"Tai it's the middle of summer," Matt chided. "And a little cold water never hurt anyone." He moved closer and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial level. "Besides, there's no way _I'm_ going to miss seeing Sora in that new suit of hers." He finished with a low whistle.

Tai scowled, crossing his arms across his chest in a huff and freezing the other with an irritated glare. He knew what Matt was trying to do, and didn't appreciate it in the least. "Don't be stupid, Matt. If everyone else is going, I guess I'll just be dragged along. Again."

It was only a few minutes later when Sora emerged from her tent in the bathing suit that Matt had mentioned, a towel draped over her shoulder. The blond boy looked her up and down once in approval before turning to grin at his dark-haired partner. "Kicking and screaming all the way, right?"

Tai punched him in the shoulder.

*****

__

Some time later, in a subterranean cave elsewhere on the mountain.

"Just five of them? Are you sure?"

"I can count to five, Rio," the gangly boy replied in a jaded voice, his eyes darting nervously about the room as if he were expecting trouble at any moment. "That's all there were. _Five._ And before you think to ask, no, I haven't been drinking today."

The slender girl with the pale skin and dark, serious eyes frowned. "Daven," she said, focusing her attention on the ashen-faced boy in front of her. "Are the three that he wanted here, at least?"

The other turned with a start as a tremendous roar echoing from far away shook the cavern, and Rio rolled her eyes. Daven had bordered on neurotic before any of this started. As things were, she wondered that he hadn't given himself a heart attack. "Uh huh," the boy returned absently, obvious more focused on the noise at his back than on her. "But Roan owes me for not strangling the two little ones when I had the chance."

Rio snorted. "Go ahead. At least it'll be your ass on the line this time and not mine. I know _I'd _much rather have his attention focused on you instead of on me. Just remember what he told you he'd do if you didn't get this right."

Daven's eyes continued in their dance around the room as he remembered just that, and the blood drained from his already pallid face. "You... you know him better than me, Rio. He wouldn't... really do something like _that_, would he?"

"If you get him mad, Daven, you'd better pray that's all he'll do. Better yet, you might just want to toss yourself off of a nearby cliff or something, because some of the stuff that I've seen him do to people I wouldn't want to wish on anybody..." The girl's eyes darkened heavily. "Well, anybody who isn't Roan himself, anyway," she amended.

Another roar shook the cavern, and Daven flinched. He needed a drink. Badly. He _knew _he should have never gotten himself involved with this group. Sure, he'd had his problems in the past, but Roan... Roan was a butcher. Vicious. He _enjoyed _hurting people, sometimes seemingly just for the sadistic pleasure of doing so. But at least he seemed to know what he was doing, and if that boy with the other group could silence the damned roaring noise that _that _beast was continually making... well, so much the better.

"Daven!" came an unexpected, rich voice at his back. The slender boy trembled and stiffened to attention at the sound, but did not turn. He knew well the domineering voice, and could literally feel the imposing presence of the other as he approached. "Yes… yes, Roan?" he answered timidly.

"Well?"

"They are here… five of them, at least." And now the younger boy chanced to peek back over his shoulder at the very dark, very masculine figure of Roan Kuroda. Standing as he was in front of the only source of light in the room made his shadow stretch and fall over each of them, threatening to swallow them whole. The wickedness of his presence, calm though he was, was almost overpowering.

"What about the three?"

Daven gave a nervous nod. "Yes, they're all here. B... but you're wasting your time with the young ones. They're completely innocent, and seem quite incorruptible to me."

The older teen's lips curled into a smile as he placed a firm hand of fictitious camaraderie on the other's shoulder, right at the curve of his neck. "Is that right, Daven? So I'm... _wasting my time_, you say. And because I value your opinion so, I'm sure that you can explain to me why I'm... _wasting my time_."

Daven cringed, uncomfortably aware of Roan's strong grip so close to his throat and the dangerous calm in his words. With trembling fingers he pulled up the talisman that dangled from a chain around his neck. "This thing... 'crest' or whatever the old man called them. _It_ told me. Roan, I could hear it in my head. It... I don't know... it warned me away from them."

Roan's fingers tightened for a moment, then pulled away from the other's neck as he deliberated for a moment. Not that he doubted Daven's account. For one, the boy was obviously too frightened to lie, and for two, he had also felt the consciousness of his own crest of Hatred inside his head from time to time. "Still..." he trailed off musingly, folding his hands together, "...Still, we will try." He glanced across the room at Rio, who had thus far remained silent. "Sister? Next time _you _go. Take Leiko with you, and bring them back here. I don't care how. Ask them, trick them... seduce them if you must. That's what you two are good at, isn't it?"

The girl flushed with shame, but nodded her head in timid agreement. "Yes... yes, Roan. I understand. I'll bring them back."


	2. Chapter II

Rio drew her worn cloak tight around her thin shoulders as she approached the figure kneeling near the campfire, her mind locked in silent commune with the blue stone in her pocket. This was to be an enormous test of her abilities, and in preparation she cleared her mind of all extraneous distractions. To null the affection among a group of casual friends for one another was easy enough, and something she'd done often in the past, but to attempt to dissolve the infinitely stronger bond between parent and child? That was certain to prove to be something else entirely.

__

"Rio! Over here! I think I found a place!"

The raven-haired girl turned and slogged through the rain and mud towards her brother's voice, her hair plastered in tendrils to her face. It had been two days since she and the others had fled the camp, with all of its guards and councilors, and during those two days all that they'd eaten was a couple of stale candy bars and a package of chips that Ian had thought to bring along. Stupid.

She followed the sound of her brother's voice into a cave, floundering through the thick strands of moss that had grown over the entrance. Though it was much too dark to judge with any degree of certainty, the echoes of their voices far into the depths made her suspect that the cavern was quite large. It was a few moments later when the remainder of their small band straggled in behind her: Leiko, Daven, Ian, and finally little Cole. "Oh, this is simply... perfect," Roan hissed, peering forward into the almost sinister darkness.

"Perfect? This?" she sighed, too tired to take the care that she normally took when dealing with her brother. "Roan, isn't it about time we just gave up and went back? We've been wandering around for nearly three days now and we still don't have any idea where we're going. We've got no food, no water, and no place to go."

The taller boy turned on his sister and raised his hand as if to strike her, then paused in mid-swing. He looked at the cringing girl in front of him with a dangerous glower in his eyes. "No, Rio. There's no way in hell that I'm going back. Not now, not ever. And neither are you. No more sessions with counselors, no more rehab work. From now on, I'm in charge."

"But… but Roan?" asked Cole timidly, tugging on the older boy's dark coat. "I'm hungry. Really, really hungry."

Roan towered over the other. The smallest of their group was thirteen this summer but still talked and acted as if he were ten. "Grow up!" he snapped back. "You all wanted to come, and I told you that if I brought you along I'd kill any of you who tried to leave! Leiko! Give me that flashlight!"

The girl nonchalantly handed over the item, then gave a silent glower at her "leader's" back as he swiveled and switched on the light. He marched forward alone, then was joined by the hulking thug of the group, Ian, who obeyed Roan's every command without a second, or probably even first, thought.

"Pardon me, sir?" the young girl ventured, folding her hands in front of her dirty dress. She was taking pains to look as simple and harmless as possible.

The man sitting alone at his fire turned to glance over his shoulder, a surprised look in his eyes. "Oh! Hello."

The girl smiled an innocuous response as her fingers closed tightly around the midnight-blue crest in her pocket, stroking it and focusing her mind on the spirit therein, melding their intentions together as one. This man was the only one in charge of the children that they had been sent to take, so she must break his care for them. The last thing they needed was this man to raise an alarm when they all turned up missing. Still, to make a man indifferent about what happened to his own daughter... even with the mystical power at her command... she just wasn't sure how effective this would be.

But then, she didn't dare disappoint Roan...

She was concentrating so hard on the link between the two that a headache born of pressure started to burn behind her temples. She could feel the rhythmic stroke of the crest as its heartbeat pounded against her clenched palm. "Your... your daughter, sir."

A quizzical look gradually formed on the man's face then, and his eyes gave the appearance of being clouded over. His brow was furrowed deeply, as though he were trying to remember something... something that should have been of great importance to him. "My... daughter..."

Utter agony now, as the searing heat worked to sever the strong emotional bonds between the man and his offspring. The child was so very prominent in his thoughts. "She's getting bored here, sir, and wanted permission to come further up the mountain to visit some friends of mine."

"Bored...? Oh, yes... bored, I suppose..." the man droned on, and slowly started to nod. "People her age sometimes get... bored..." There was, after all, no real reason for him to be concerned about whatever his daughter wanted to do with this strange girl. It wouldn't inconvenience him in the least, just so long as she was back here and ready to go when the time came to depart.

The heat against Rio's hand was searing her as she clenched the crest of Apathy tightly, and she longed to release it. But the pain was muted by grim satisfaction as it also, with that same heat, burned off the last frown of concern on the man's face. "Oh well, okay," he replied, waving his hand as if unconcerned. "Whatever makes you kids happy."

Rio let go of the breath that she had been unconsciously holding, and released the scorching heat of the crest. She almost imagined that she could smell burnt flesh, but knew from experience that there would be no mark on her hand to evidence what she'd just undergone. "Thanks, mister… ah, sir," she said to excuse herself, then turned and started on her long trek back to the cave. She had done her part, now the rest was up to Leiko.

__

"Come on! Keep up!" Roan snapped at the small group trudging along behind him. The thin, faltering illumination that came from the flashlight kept the darkness in the cave from smothering them, but on reflection, Rio probably would preferred absolute darkness just as well. It would have at least prevented the ugly shadows on the walls; shadows that unnerved them all but absolutely terrified Cole.

Then they rounded a corner, and were surprised to find that the next portion of the cave was already occupied. A good-sized fire was burning on the floor in the center of the room, bringing the illumination in this enormous portion of the cavern to an almost tolerable level. A wizened old man sat by one side of the blaze and poked at it with a stick, coughing as though every breath that he took would be his last. Roan looked around at his followers, then motioned for Ian to follow him to the man's side.

The stranger appeared to take no notice of the pair as they stopped behind them. "All right, old man," Roan demanded scornfully. "Clear out. This is our territory now."

Leiko'e eyes widened in dismay as she crept forward and stood at Roan's back. "What are you doing?" she demanded of him in a frantic whisper. "If we throw him out he'll tell somebody that we're here and then we'll all get caught!" If Roan heard the girl's challenge he didn't answer it, and stood impassively with his arms folded across his chest.

The old man slowly craned his head over his shoulder to stare at the other and Roan, who feared nothing, caught one glimpse of his eyes and stepped back, right into the giant Ian. "What the hell are you?" he demanded in a disgusted voice. At the twisted sight of the man's face Cole turned and buried his face into Rio's shoulder, though he had reached puberty and was almost as tall as she.

The other did not immediately respond to the question, and slowly turned back towards his fire. He looked wretched, and rather disinclined to even acknowledge the group... though he could not have possibly missed the threat in Roan's words or stance. If Rio had been forced to say, she'd guess that he was only waiting there to die. 

"I don't think you hear too good, old man," taunted Daven, pulling himself up to his entire puny height and advancing on the other, confident that Ian was there to handle any trouble. "Roan said to clear out, and as far as you're concerned, his voice is the voice of God."

Now the man groaned and rose to his feet, though he continued to face the fire. And when he responded, it was with what sounded like a rather distant and unconcerned tone of voice. "Is that true... Roan, is it? Is yours truly the voice of God for me? For you see... I have been waiting for a god. Or at least something of the like." And as the last echoes of the other's voice died off into the cavern, Rio thought that a peculiar type of hunger had replaced the indifference within it.

Daven slowly backed away from the aged man with a quick glance at Roan, as if looking to him for guidance. Roan frowned and motioned Ian forward with a nod of his head. "Look, freak," the dark teen said patiently. "This doesn't have to hurt."

"Ah," replied the other, sounding contemplative. "But you'd prefer it if it did, wouldn't you, Roan? That's half the fun of being a god. To be able to cause whatever suffering you wish at a whim, and be above any retribution, yes? To make others fear you, to the point that they'll do anything to keep you happy with them? Anything, Roan..."

The boy snorted. "See, this is what I get for being a nice guy. Okay, Ian," he finished, jerking his thumb in the direction of the ragged figure. 

The hulking figure of Roan's thug stepped forward and clapped a heavy hand down on the shoulder of the old man. But instead of reacting in alarm, the aged figure simply pulled a closed fist from the pocket of the garment he was wearing. A fist that flickered with an odd, bluish glow from within. And then, oddly and quite suddenly, Ian's giant hand went limp and literally slid off of the man's shoulder.

Roan's brow furrowed tightly together, and he stepped to Ian's side with a dangerous look on his face. He did not tolerate hesitation or disobedience from those he led. "What the hell do you think you're doing, you lumbering sideshow attraction? I just told you to get this damned fool out of my cave. Now move!"

But Ian didn't move, only stood there in mute silence with his great hands dangling limply at his side. The old man turned to Roan and shrugged, his eerie eyes studying the boy intently. "And thus, the voice of God is silenced for him. Now pray, don't be upset with your large friend, Roan. You could stick a gun to his head or run him through with a knife right now and he wouldn't care in the least. You could kick him in the groin as hard as you like, and while the pain would be real enough for him, he wouldn't feel any anger towards you. His is now a state of perfect, blissful indifference."

Behind the three, Rio had to affix Daven with a stern glance to keep him from going through with a test of the man's final illustration.

But Roan, of course, had no such restraints on himself. Angrily he clenched his fist and smashed it into the side of Ian's ugly face. The enormous youth took a step backwards and looked to wince a bit, but otherwise his stance and demeanor did not change.

Roan turned on the man. "Fine, then I'll do it myself," he scowled, grabbing a fistful of the other's shirt and pulling him close. "You wanna see if you can screw with my head like that?"

The other's unnatural, yellow eyes flashed a longing at the boy. "Yes... yes, you'll do. You'll do perfectly." He bowed his head. "Oh no, I doubt that I could do the same to you. In you there is rage_. There is hatred, the likes of which I've never felt before. I would not dare even attempt to emasculate such power."_

The eyes of the two locked for a moment, as if feeling one another out. "I can help you, Roan. I can give you more power than you've ever dreamed about in your short life. I can give you the means by which all of your power-hungry and murderous dreams can come true..." And as he spoke the man's voice fell in a steady decrescendo to a point where it almost became a private, hypnotic invitation for Roan's ears alone.

"Short life? I'm near on seventeen old man," Roan growled back in response. "And you'd better not be implying that I need your help. Or I swear by the time I'm done with you you'll be begging for me to let you die."

The other approached the scowling boy and brought his face close to his, the defiant response answering for him in the affirmative. The bright, seemingly unnaturally bright eyes stared into Roan's dark ones. "Let me help you, boy. Let me make you more than what you are. And I swear by the time I'm done, you will _be a god."_

Leiko's face betrayed a patronizing smirk as she spied on the small group of children surrounding the campfire. The three older children on one side sitting on a log, the girl in between the two boys who kept flashing suspicious glance back at one another, and the two youngest sitting on the opposite side, holding hands. And suddenly she knew just what Daven had meant. The treacly sentimentality of the younger pair was enough to make her want to throw up.

"Man, you are pig-headed!" Matt almost shouted, leaning across to look at Tai. "How does getting your head messed with by that sick, screwball clown make you evil?"

Tai winced and turned away. "Not evil, Matt. _Susceptible _to evil. All that time he was there, doing whatever he wanted, and I couldn't fight him. I wasn't strong enough, and all of you almost paid with your lives because I wasn't."

"He's right, Tai," said Sora gently, taking the boy's hand in a comforting manner. "Whatever Piedmon did with your body, it wasn't you. And you're expecting too much of yourself, if you think that you should have been able to fight him off once he was already in control. Think about all of those people in the restaurant. He had total control over them in seconds, and he wasn't stuck inside _their _heads."

The boy appeared a bit less melancholy at the girl's words and her hand on his own, but then a single glance at the younger pair across the fire beat him back down. Even though it had not, ultimately, happened that way, he could see the sword in his hand as it drove through Kari's back and straight through into T.K.'s chest, pinning both of their dead bodies to the ground. He could see it now as clearly as he saw it whenever he closed his eyes to sleep at night. The sight haunted and terrified him, and made absolution impossible.

"Okay, so you weren't evil," Matt continued to thrust away mercilessly. "What then? You found out that you're not as strong as you expected to be, or maybe as you wanted to be, and it scared you? So what? That's not a character flaw, that's part of being human. A _real _character flaw is expecting yourself to have been able to withstand him, even though you have no idea how strong he really was."

Now Tai was on his feet, his hands balled into fists at his side. "Why don't you just shut up, Matt? Willing or not, I helped him do what he wanted with all of you. You don't have any idea how that feels! I left you all, helpless, to become a tool of evil! How do I know I'll be strong enough to resist the next time somebody wants to use me like that? I might as well be a stupid little puppet!"

__

Okay, that's it! Leiko rose from her crouched position and eased meekly into their camp. T.K. and Kari looked at the newcomer suspiciously as she cleared her throat. "Hello," she murmured, trying to feign a girlish nervousness.

Tai and Matt were on their feet as one, and turned to stare at the darkly handsome girl. Leiko, unlike her partner Rio, was full-figured and was well endowed in her more feminine attributes, even at a young age. And moreover, she was also well aware of how she looked and just how attractive she was to those of the opposite sex. "Hello," they each replied in a nonchalant tone, though the look on their faces betrayed a somewhat more animated response.

Leiko favored the pair with a rather alluring smile, and then nodded politely to the others. "I... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to disturb your party, but my name is Leiko Kimura, and I've been sent to deliver an exceedingly urgent message to the five of you. A message that I hope will convince you to come with me right away." She flashed a demure glance in Tai's direction. "Which of you is Taichi Kamiya?"

The dark-haired boy stepped forward with a self-confident smirk on his face as Sora crossed her arms and looked away in disgust. _Trust Tai to forget his problems at the sight of a glimmer in the eye of a single pretty girl._

Sora stepped forward. "From who, did you say?" she replied coolly, rather bluntly making the point that any decision regarding their little group would not be made by Tai alone. T.K. had caught a single glimpse at the eyes of the girl who he now considered as much an older sister as anything before she'd turned to speak. _She doesn't like her either._

Leiko smiled back innocently, her face betraying no hint of the scowl at her mind was directing at Sora. She hoped that when it came time for the reckoning, Roan would have no use for that one.

A moment or two passed, and Leiko realized that she'd gone too long without speaking. "I'm... I'm sorry, Taichi. The name that I was told to give you was 'Gennai', and that the name alone would serve well enough as a token of sincerity to you five. To be quite honest, the one who asked that I give you the name seemed somewhat... unique... to me, but assured me that you would know the significance of it."

Matt rolled his eyes skyward. "Well 'unique' isn't a description I've heard yet, anyway."

Sora saw Tai contemplating what the new girl has said, and frowned. She stepped to the boy's side and addressed Leiko. "Will you excuse us for just a moment?" She then grabbed Tai by the ear and led him over to the far side of the fire.

"Oww! Hey!" the boy chirped in an embarrassed protest.

"Are you insane?" Sora demanded of him in a fervent whisper. "We aren't going with her! You don't just have a stranger walk into our camp in the middle of the night, say _'Gennai' _and go traipsing off with her around the mountain to who-knows-where! I _know _you're smarter than that, and you'd better not be letting that body of hers," she jerked a thumb in the direction of the other girl, "make you otherwise."

Tai's couldn't seem able to make his eyes meet with Sora's for a moment, completely aware that allowing her to see them at that moment would have confirmed just such a thing for her. But still...

"I'm going, Sora. She's right: any human who knows Gennai by name almost _has _to have credibility with us. 'Unique'? Yeah, she's seen him, too. So what? Is she one of us, or just somebody who Gennai's using to get us a message? Either way it's important enough to pay attention to, and I am going."

__

"You see," said the old man, moving to the other side of the cavern after having freed Ian from his bemusement. "I have been waiting for you. Oh not for you _in particular, you understand, but rather for a group of your bearing. To keep the universe in balance... it was inevitable that you should come."_

"Oh-kay..." Daven murmured derisively to the others while making a circular 'crazy' motion with his finger.

The old man silenced the boy with a stare and then continued. "You all will see that I am not from your world... at least not originally." The others gave a collective snort as the man continued, his voice becoming a bit wistful. "It was a very, very long time ago in my world when I... much like you, Roan... sought to be something other than ordinary. And, like you, very few appreciated the methods that I chose for becoming... more that what I was."

"But you don't become extraordinary without taking some risks, do you Roan? And, unfortunately, one of the risks that I took failed in the worst way. In the middle of one of the most pitched battles in the history of my world I switched sides, assisting one who, in time, would the greatest criminal genius that my world had ever seen."

The six followed the old man as if hypnotized. "You see, I had been what you would call a scientist. And the time eventually came when the genius of whom I spoke organized an attack upon our laboratory to stop an event that was destined to bring about his downfall. That genius, Piedmon to his allies, broke into our laboratory and tried to stop what had been prophesied to happen before it ever could. He failed in his attempt, the prophecy was fulfilled, and now he is dead. Shortly thereafter I was banished here, to this world, because I chose the wrong side."

"And what does any of this have to do with us?" Rio demanded of him.

"I'm getting to that!" the other snapped. "You see, the prophecy of which I speak was satisfied only with the assistance of a group of younger children from your _world. They came through a dimensional rift while atop this very mountain, and assisted a rival of mine named Gennai in his mission to stop that little maneuver of ours."_

"That's a stupid name," piped up Cole.

"These children from your world had specific traits of virtue that allowed them to make special friends in mine, great friends that helped them to fulfill this prophecy. Those virtues, however, I've always felt were more hubris than anything."

"Get to the point now, old man," snapped Roan, grabbing the other's shoulder and stopping him in his tracks. "I'm really starting to lose my patience with you."

The man shook off the hand angrily. "The point is just this -- those children ruined my world, and now I'm going to ruin theirs... with your help of course." He took a key from his pocket and unlocked a rusting, neglected cabinet that almost seemed to have been built into the cave. "And since the six of you have been rejected by your world as well, I think that you might be pleased to finally have things the way that you _want them. You see, for every good, there is always an evil. For every yin, there must be a yang. For every hero," he paused and looked at Cole, "a coward. It is the way of the universe."_

The group gathered around as the man stepped back, and saw in the cabinet a set of five pendants. The dark blue talisman still in his hand made six. And each of the ornaments seemed to shimmer with an illumination of a separate hue, although the radiance that came from them seemed to only suck the light from the cave, instead of enhancing it. "Take them," the man urged. "They're yours. You'll know which one is for each of you, and with these little trinkets you will be destined to do great and terrible things…"

"Sora, I still don't believe that your dad is letting us do this," whispered Kari, still hand-in-hand with T.K. but trailing the rest of the group.

The older girl grimaced. She didn't quite believe that he was either. It had _seemed _a good idea at the time, to force Tai to concede that they would all go along with the girl Leiko only if her father agreed to let them. She hadn't really expected him to say yes. "Kari, you heard him as well as I did. Who knows why parents do anything?"

"But Sora," said T.K., coming to the Kari's defense. "Didn't you notice something odd about him when we were talking to him? Almost like he was... preoccupied?"

Sora nodded. She would have had to have been rather preoccupied herself not to notice. The way that he brushed off such a seemingly major request as so trivial had given her great pause for thought at first, particularly as he had given such a contrary answer only the day before. Though now she was distracted by an even greater problem. The boys in front of her, both Matt and Tai, had quite suddenly turned into the world's two biggest idiots in describing their individual exploits for the benefit of the new girl. It wasn't that she had a problem with suddenly being relegated to the backs of their minds, she told herself, but for some reason she didn't entirely trust 'Leiko'.

Leiko, for her part, simply favored the pair with what might have been considered a charming smile. "Oh yes. I know _exactly _what the two of you did in the digital world," she replied, leading them well off the path and into a heavily wooded section of the mountainside. It was only a short walk later when the group finally reached the cave that the girl had promised. _Roan, you'd owe me for this. I swear, if I have to listen to either of these two simpletons for another second…_

"Here we are," she said pleasantly, ushering them all into the entrance of the cave. All but T.K. and Kari had to duck to avoid striking their heads on a low overhang that was hidden just inside the entryway. Stepping outside for a moment, Leiko took pains to rearrange the foliage that kept the place hidden from the eyes of the outside world.

A roar echoed somewhere deep within the cavern as the group entered, well before their eyes could adjust from the dim light outside to the even shallower illumination in the cavern. "What was that?" asked Sora, startled. She grabbed at the hand closest to her and squeezed it tightly, uncertain of just who it belonged to.

Tai's voice came to her out of the darkness, though it was a voice that sounded quite preoccupied at the moment. "You know..." he whispered quietly. "It kind of puts me in the mind of... it was kind of like..."

The boy's voice trailed off into silence and his face screwed up into a deep thoughtfulness as he moved quickly to catch up with Matt and Leiko. T.K., Kari and Sora gave one other a brief glance and nodded. '..._kind of like Greymon,'_ they each finished mentally. Now the older girl had a strong feeling that the most responsible thing to do would be to take the younger pair away from this place, but then realized that, with their brothers involved, they each had a greater stake in this than she. And, logic chided her, if this did pertain to digimon, they had as much a right to see it through to the end.

__

Each of the six placed the talismans around their necks, and suddenly felt a surge of… something indescribable. "What do these emblems mean?" Daven asked, peering at his own.

The old man responded with a crooked smile. "You are my evil to their good. My yang to their yin." He glanced at Roan. "My hatred to their love."

Rio. "My apathy to their friendship."

Daven. "To their reliability, my duplicity."

Leiko. "To their sincerity, my deceit."

Ian. "To their knowledge, brutality."

The runt, Cole. "For courage, timidity."

He then nodded, and clandestinely passed Roan a small, egg-shaped device while whispering something into the oldest boy's ear. The other said nothing, but looked at Cole with a frown on his face and nodded to the man.

Some six months later the man had died, and his body, surprisingly, had vanished with his death. That very night Roan, per the other's final instructions, had placed his talisman of hatred upon the device that the other had given him, and watched emotionlessly as an apparition of the old man had sprung forward from its heart. The boy listened intently as the vision spoke, and this is what he heard...

Roan Kuroda, if you are hearing this then it means that my time has passed without knowing my vengeance. But I will rest well knowing that it must come to fruition. When I was cast from my world, I pleaded that I should find those to help me avenge my fall. And you... you went beyond my wildest imaginings, Roan. You are everything that my former partner was, and more.

But of you all, one will not be able to fulfill the task that is set for him. It will destroy, and consume him. And you know which it is, for you have seen it in him as well as I.

But it may be that this will profit our cause, for I have seen that, in time, the leader of those on whom I have sworn vengeance will come to you. _He _will serve instead. Indeed, it will please me greatly that you should use him to destroy what he has saved. When he comes he will be weakened, but still useful, if you can sway him to your side.

In addition, he may joined be two others of importance... two others whose holy virtues cannot be distorted into wickedness even by my sciences. You will know them by their youth, and by the instant revulsion that you and your comrades will feel towards them. Take these two to the fourth cavern, and if they can be seduced to your cause there you will gain allies of immense power. But do NOT under any circumstances approach the fourth cavern without them. You are strong, Roan Kuroda, but what dwells therein would destroy even you.

__

And with that the image vanished from his sight, along with the egg-shaped device and leaving only Roan's blood-red talisman behind. And the following day, as he had indeed seen, the sniveling little runt Cole lost control of and was consumed by the great beast that had been summoned to serve him...


	3. Chapter III

****

Chapter Three

Leiko gave a shiver of annoyance as she inched open the makeshift door to their Roan's quarters. Merely being around that group and being witness to the affection that they all had for one another was trying on her nerves. And those two petty, _juvenile_ boys! Trying to impress her with tales of their adventures, when if she had been out in the world she could have had any _man _that she wanted. Ugh.

A muffled giggling sound came from the area that served as Roan's study. As their little group had delved further into the caverns that they now inhabited, they'd found a wide range of smaller caves and rooms that had been set up for specific purposes by their mysterious benefactor. There were living quarters (of a sort) for each of them that had seemingly been carved right out of the stone, as well as well-stocked pantries and the study. In addition, though they'd never had cause to use them, there were also 'prisons' of a type as well, rooms that had to have brought back unpleasant memories for Ian.

The girl stepped into the study. Roan was seated on a chair, with his sister straddled atop his lap. The two were locked in what appeared to be a rather incestuous (but not quite passionate) embrace. Leiko bit her lip in an angry scowl at the girl who had stolen what should have been hers before clearing her throat.

Roan didn't appear to be at all concerned at having been caught in such a situation with his sister and rose to his feet, dumping Rio to the floor. "Have you brought them?" he demanded, his dark, stern eyes studying her closely.

Leiko tried, but tried in vain, to hold up under that glare. It was only a moment before she lowered her eyes in deference to him. "Yes."

"All of them?"

The girl's swarthy cheeks flushed an even darker hue as she nodded. She was upset with herself for having been made so subservient to Roan, but could think of no easy way to put herself on a more equal footing with him now. "The one you wanted, Tai, is arguing with his friend Matt about which of them I found more attractive. There is no suspicion in them about what is really happening here. But the others seem to have some doubts about being here. Particularly the younger pair. Be careful what you say around those two, Roan... there's something odd about them."

Roan frowned, then gave her a nod in return. This was the third time he'd been warned off the younger pair, but he insisted upon claiming the power that they could bring to him. "Under what pretext did you bring them?"

"As agreed. The very mention of the name 'Gennai' brought them to attention with no argument whatsoever."

Rio smirked at Roan from her place on the floor, and exhaled a small chuckle. "You don't actually think that he'll do what you're asking, do you big brother? Those five were part of the group that risked their lives several times to save the world, if our friend was being honest. Now you're going to ask him to help you enslave it?"

Roan's eyes bore down upon his sister with a dangerous look of haughty superiority in them. "Sister... _dearest _sister... when did I ever _ask _anything of anyone? If his mind was truly as ravaged by Piedmon as our dear friend insinuated, our combined strength should be more than enough to push him over the edge and into my service. Leiko's efforts have already shown us that we can manipulate he and his friends at will. As it happens, I've already sent Daven to entertain our guests and follow up with whatever impairment that he can muster."

Rio continued to grin. She fully expected her brother to succeed at what he was trying to accomplish, all the while hoping for a failure that she would be present to witness. "And if he realizes what you're trying to do to him? What then?"

"Trust in me, Rio. He will submit. I have studied what materials our friend has left us, and I tell you that even at his best, Tai Kamiya would be no match for me. As he is... I will dominate him easily. He will not refuse the return to prominence that I have to offer him. And I will present it to him in an attractive and noble enough package for his mind to convince his spirit that only good can come of my offer. And then? He will acquiesce. You cannot, after all, place a chick back in the egg once it has spread its wings, can you... _dearest _sister?"

*****

Daven smiled while he spoke to the group as genially as his admittedly uncongenial upbringing would allow. His nature was far from outgoing, but the boy had spent many of his early years on the rough streets of Iwaki learning how to gain the allies necessary to survive. Several of those same allies had watched with bewilderment in their eyes as the lanky boy had later betrayed them to their deaths in order to gain more and stronger associates. And now, with the mindbending resources of the crest of Duplicity at his command, the boy had perfected his talent almost to an art. Even as he spoke to the dark-haired boy who was the leader of this group, the crest concealed beneath his shirt started to grow warmer as it exercised its power against the emotions of all present.

Then, uneasily, Daven saw the youngest boy lean over and whisper something to the girl beside him, who nodded in response. Leiko had warned him that, while there was a strong bond between the entire group, it was particularly strong between these two. She'd also implied that her power of Deceit did not seem to affect them. And so he brought the conversation to a rather abrupt end and excused himself from the group, hoping that he had done enough to let Roan do what he desired with their leader. In any event, he'd learned long ago not to put his hand so far out that he could not draw it back at his need.

Matt looked at Sora, who was still fuming and staring sharp daggers at him. "Hey! What's wrong?" he asked with concern.

"Look at the two of you!" she hissed a whisper back at the boy. "We've just followed a stranger at least three miles from where we should be just because she mentions Gennai's name, and instead of being concerned about who she is or where she's taking us, you two start trying to flirt with her! Never mind that she's at least three years older than you!"

Both Tai and Matt took immediate action to avoid the girl's eyes, both appearing at once to have found something suddenly fascinating about the chamber walls surrounding them. Torches of some kind of another lined those walls, but what burned in them clearly was not fire. Tai was on the verge of going to investigate just what it was that made them cast their light when…

"Hello, my friends!" a deep voice welcomed the group from somewhere behind the shadows. Matt, Tai and Sora turned as one and watched as a tall figure dressed in black stepped from the shadows, placing a foot on the stone in front of them. "My name is Roan Kuroda, and I thank the five of you for coming."

Tai stood up. "Tai Kamiya," he answered with a nod of the head and moving to shake Roan's hand. "These are Sora, Matt, T.K. and my sister Kari," he said, indicating the others in turn. Despite her misgivings about being in that place, Sora allowed herself a weak smile of relief. For the first time in a long time, he was at least beginning to act like their leader again.

Roan smiled. "I know who you all are. In fact, from the point of view of those who are aware of the digital world, the five of you are very nearly legend. I daresay that I appreciate what you have done for both this world and that one more than most that you will meet."

Tai acknowledged the boy with an appreciative, but still grim, nod. The fact that few people in the real world had acknowledged what they'd done for it had been a sore spot of his for some time. "The girl who brought us said that you had news of Gennai?"

"Indeed... though, to be strictly accurate, what I have for you is a warning that comes by way of a comrade of his," Roan replied. "At one time you were, I believe, told what happened the day that the one you know as Gennai rescued the eggs of your Digimon partners from the agents of the dark masters? Our friend was with him prior to that day."

"So what is it that you wanted to tell us?"

Roan paused and studied the group. His criminal background notwithstanding, he was blessed with a brilliant mind and was carefully assessing what he would say next. "Did you ever wonder if something similar to what you prevented in the other world might one day try to take hold in ours?"

The five peered at him quizzically. "Or in other words," he continued, "that an evil force… or person, or thing might some day try to come to rule in this world by using the power of that one?"

"It's been tried before," Sora prompted the other. "If you know as much about us as you say, then you certainly know when."

"Exactly," Roan answered with a sage nod, as if the girl had made his point for him. "Myotismon. He was relatively weak as far as evil masters go, but he still managed to take your city with little or no interference from its authorities, correct?"

"Yes, but we _did _beat him," Kari interrupted. Both she and T.K. had remained nervously silent for most of the time that they had all been in the cave, but she felt compelled to speak now. After all, she herself had taken a major role in ensuring that the evil of Myotismon had been driven from the city.

Roan nodded, turning his smile on the girl in a way that deepened her discomfort. "Agreed. You beat him. Not the military, and not the police… you. And what did you receive at the completion of that great task, hmm? Accolades? Prominence? Thanks, even? Or nothing? Nothing but scorn from those who in their own minds twisted what had really happened until _they_ were not really in danger?"

"Are you saying that its about to happen again?"

"It might, Matt." And this time, the words came not from Roan, but from Tai. It was not, after all, the first time that he had worried about such a thing. He could well remember his eyes searching the sky in trepidation, simply waiting for it to split once again in order to allow a blitzkrieg of dark forces to invade from that world into his own. And this time, who would stop them? His own way to the digital world had been closed, leaving him with no way to bring back the aid that had saved them the time before...

"Indeed," continued Roan, now with his back to them in a seemingly offhand manner. "And now there are no digimon allied with you to stop that next time, are there? What now?"

The children, with the exception of T.K., all glanced at one another. But no answer was forthcoming before Sora spoke. "I still don't understand what you want us to do about it."

A feral roar now echoed throughout the cavern, similar to the one that they had heard upon entering. This time Tai heard the noise more clearly, and a far off look started in his eyes. Roan turned and smiled, and though the look was friendly enough, there was something about it that seemed a bit off. "Hopefully more than you did last time." Now he focused solely on Tai. "_You _understand, don't you? You hear him calling to you. This time, I want you to be ready not only to defend the world, but make it ready to defend itself. Force them to take this threat seriously!"

Matt's eyes narrowed at the choice of words. Finally he was starting to understand what this conversation was leading up to. "You intend to create that threat..."

Roan bowed his head and shook it slowly. "Consider it a vaccination, Matt Ishisa. A vaccination. Force the authorities to recognize and acknowledge the power of these creatures before something truly terrible happens." The older teen spread his hands to emphasis his harmless intent." If such a creature, perhaps under Tai's command, shows up in the center of town one day and causes a bit of superficial damage without really hurting anyone, would that be such a bad thing? Especially if it gives the authorities cause to formulate a plan that might forestall future attacks that are not so restrained?" 

Tai stood quite still, his eyes narrow as if in deep thought. Ever since they had left the digital world, when his thoughts were his own, he had felt that something was missing without his friend. Could this really be it? Were their digimon partners no more than a security blanket that they clung to when the dreams of another attack came upon them? "He... he may have a point..."

"What?" demanded Matt and Sora, coming to their feet. "Tai listen to what he's saying!" the blond boy exclaimed wildly. "He wants you to use that Greymon to make the world see you as a threat!" He turned to Roan. "That _is _what we're hearing, right? You've got a Greymon here, and you want Tai to try to control it."

Tai turned on Matt, fury in his eyes. "And how bad would that be? Do you want to continue to be a joke? To continue to hear that the danger couldn't have been all _that _great, because it was stopped by a group of stupid kids? Do you want to keep looking up at the sky and being afraid because you know that, next time, there won't be anything there to stop it?"

"Listen to you!" snapped Sora at Matt. "You are supposed to uphold the virtue of friendship, but I haven't seen very much that's friendly from you for the past month! If going to see whatever is making that noise is going to help Tai…"

Roan grinned as he felt the crest concealed beneath his shirt exhale its angry heat and throb against his skin like a second heartbeat. The rage beginning to rise to the surface among these three friends was like a furnace lit within the cold recesses of his soul. But then, just as suddenly, he felt it begin to run cold again as he glanced over at the younger two. For at that very moment the living Crest of Hatred allowed him to see truly, and Roan became well aware that, throbbing beneath the shirt of T.K. Takaishi and in direct opposition to his own, a golden heartbeat surrounded and protected the pair. 

"I don't need you coming to my defense!" Tai shouted, turning now on Sora. "If anything, you've been less of a friend than he has, even though that's pretty hard to do!"

"Stop it!" screamed Kari, coming to her feet. But to the others' surprise her outburst was not directed at Matt, Sora or her brother, but rather at their host. Roan looked surprised, even unnerved at the younger girl's reaction as his hand drifted unconsciously to the front of his shirt. Kari looked to be on the verge of tears and abruptly turned and darted off into the cave, sobbing fiercely as she went.

T.K.'s heart ached as he watched the girl run off, and was instantly on his feet and after her. "Kari!" he called, his voice echoing far into the cave.

Roan frowned. He had been prepared for something like this to happen, but it was thoroughly disappointing nonetheless. With a clandestine nod that the three remaining children could not see, he indicated to his underling in the shadows what steps were to be taken. Matt started after his little brother, only to be stopped by the firm hand of Roan around his arm. The older boy's grip was like iron. "Wait, it's okay. You'd only get lost down there, the caverns are so extensive. I'll send one of the others to find them and bring them back. Why don't the three of you at least come and see what I have to say. If you think I'm wrong then you can just leave, right?"

Matt frowned and looked after the younger children, then to Tai and back again. Sora's words had stung him fiercely. He had thought that he had been a good friend when Tai needed him, but from the reactions of the two he had been anything but. He took a deep breath. "Okay, but just a quick talk and then I'm going to look for T.K."

*****

T.K. followed the corridor through a dizzying variety of twists and turns, each of which seemed to take him further into the depths. He was soon became afraid that, when he did find Kari, they would be unable to find their way back out. Were it anyone but her, he might also have been worried about being able to find them in such a maze... but of course, between the two of them that was never a possibility. The Crest of Hope under his shirt warmed gently. He would always know where to find her.

It was perhaps five minutes later when he came upon the girl, sitting against the wall with her knees drawn up to her chest and sniffling loudly. He gave a concerned, devoted look and then sat down by her side, draping an arm over her shoulders. The girl buried her brown eyes into his shoulder and continued to weep for just another moment or so before looking up. "Oh, T.K.! It was so horrible. It was just like he… he's so… so..."

"Evil?" the boy finished for her. "Yeah, I know. I felt it, too. This whole place is. He was somehow pushing the others to make them snap at each other like that."

Kari dried her eyes and rose unsteadily to her feet, assisted by the boy. "We've… we've got to go back and get them, T.K., and then leave. Sora was right, we shouldn't have even come in the first place." But then her face fell as she peered back at the narrow corridor through which she had run. "But I don't remember the way. I must have passed a dozen turns."

The boy smiled gently. "A couple of dozen at least. But I think as long as we're always going uphill we'll be more or less on the right path. We were headed down the entire time."

Kari hugged him close, thankful for his staunch support in the face of her admittedly foolish flight from the caverns. "I'm just glad you stopped when you did," he murmured into her ear.

"Why?"

T.K. nodded in the direction away from the corridor, to the place where the illumination from the artificial torches stopped. There, hidden in the darkness, was the boundary of a large crevice in the exact center of the cavern floor. As the pair inched closer, they found that there were roots of some sort growing on the edge of the chasm, and the gravelly surface made the footing extremely unstable. Kari shuddered at what might have been, had she not stopped. By the time she would have seen the danger, it would have been far too late to stop. "Let's get out of here," she whispered.

Unbeknownst to the pair, another twosome had already followed the trail that they had left on their way to the abyss. The snarling canine was crouched low to the ground as he watched the young children made their way back into the main corridor, restrained from attacking only by the touch of his mistress' hand on his fur of his collar. "No, wait," she murmured to the hulking beast. "See where they go. This may yet work out the way that Roan wants it to."

*****

"Matt what are you doing?" demanded Sora, catching up to him and grabbing the boy's arm to pull him to a stop. It had been a few moments earlier when she noticed that he had turned around and was headed back to the main cavern while Tai had continued to follow Roan into the depths. The girl had been torn about which of the boys to stay with for a moment before finally deciding to trail Matt. At least she knew where Tai was heading.

"I'm going back to look for T.K. and Kari," the boy answered gruffly, turning his head away from her. "No matter how good or bad of a friend I may be, I know that Tai can look out for himself. I'm not sure that those two can."

Sora bit her lip and bowed her head, falling a step behind the obviously irritated boy. "Matt I'm so sorry. I don't even have any idea what made me say that. I know you've been doing all that you can to help Tai. We all have. It was just... back there when you snapped at him I just felt so mad at you that I _had _to say something nasty like that, even though I knew it wasn't true."

Matt stopped short, and glanced an apology back over his shoulder at her. He exhaled. "Yeah... yeah, I know. I felt the same way. I was going to say something to Tai, but what I said didn't come out at all like I had intended."

Sora frowned. "Let's… let's just go find them, Matt. I'll help. They've got to be back this way somewhere."

But then, just as they had turned to go, both stopped suddenly and looked up. There in front of them and blocking their way, was the boy that had tried to entertain them upon their arrival… Daven, he'd said his name was. But what made them stop was neither his presence nor the disturbingly evil look in his eyes. It was something much bigger, towering above the slender boy.

It was an Ikkakumon.

*****

T.K. and Kari watched from their hiding place as the one called Daven forced Matt and Sora into a sort of jail cell and shoved them in, his authority enforced by the Ikkakumon towering at his side. It came as no surprise to the pair. They had spent the last ten minutes trying to avoid a Garurumon that was being led around by a dark-haired girl, one who looked so similar to Roan that they suspected that they were related. Like the Garurumon, the Ikkakumon did not look at all like the one that they had gotten used to in their time in the digital world. The colors were more muted and there was a distinct lack of intelligence in its eyes, but the fangs and the single horn jutting out from its forehead looked no less deadly.

"Now what?" T.K. asked, but the girl placed a finger to his lips to hush him and pressed him back against the wall as their pursuers trotted past them to join up with Matt and Sora's jailer.

"Did you catch them, Rio?" Daven asked.

The girl shook her head. "But they're still somewhere around here. I want you to take him," she jerked her thumb up at the Ikkakumon, "and get back to block the entrance to the cave. I don't want those two getting out of here like that."

"What about these two?" Daven demanded, motioning towards the cell door. "Roan wanted them held until he gets back to decide what to do with them."

"I'll handle my brother _and _both of them. You just get to the entrance and set up a barricade, understand?" She leaned closer and took a longer sniffed the air about them for a moment. "And get rid of the liquor, you damned fool. This little scheme of Roan's is about _this _close to blowing up in his face, and we can't afford to have you drunk, not now. Understand?"

The boy's eyes darkened as he nodded, far from pleased about the situation, then bowed to the authority she wielded under her brother and turned to leave with the massive sea creature tromping along behind him. When the pair were gone the girl sat down with her back to the wall, and her canine companion situated himself directly in front of the door behind which sat Matt and Sora and lay down, resting his muzzle across his folded paws.

****

"Damn!" Matt swore, slamming his fist violently into the stone wall. Then, _"Oww," _he whimpered, clutching his hand and bringing it to his mouth.

"Matt that isn't going to help," Sora chided and turned around, sitting on the hard, damp floor.

The boy sighed and nodded glumly while continuing to rub his injured knuckles and sat down as well, wrapping his arms around his knees and burying his face in his arms. "T.K.," he whispered quietly.

Sora felt an urge to go and comfort the boy, then stopped. She was unsure just how he would take the gesture. It was becoming increasingly clear to her that once again he and Tai were in some sort of a competition for her affections, and that, more than anything, made her feel both fortunate and furious at the same time. As she had once demanded in a fit of frustration, "What makes either of you think that I'm choosing between the two of you?" The outburst had afterwards embarrassed them all, but now gave her pause for thought. Was she choosing between them?

She had been on outings with both boys quite frequently -- "outings" because she absolutely refused to call them "dates". She had also kissed both at one time or another, but none of those times had ever had any real romantic significance for her. She had always considered herself much too young to be involved in a serious relationship, yet here were T.K. and Kari both three years her junior considerably happy to be sharing one themselves.

Did she love either of them? Or worse yet, both of them? She had always told herself that she would not begin a relationship simply to become involved in one. But since she really had no scale on which to measure them, she was afraid that feelings of romantic love might one day come upon her but that she would not recognize them and so simply ignore them. Yet months ago she felt secure enough to give advice to T.K. when he wanted to know how to approach his as of then unannounced relationship with Kari. What had she told him then?

__

Don't talk to me about it. You should know who to talk to, and even though it'll the toughest thing you've ever had to do to talk to them about it, in the end you'll understand.

Or something to that effect. The point being that, sooner or later, she would have to come out and talk to Tai and Matt about what she was feeling. To save her sanity it would probably have to be sooner. Well, since she couldn't exactly talk with both of them about it at the same time, and since she apparently had nothing better to do right now…

"Hey, Matt?"

"Hmm?"

*****

"T.K. that's crazy even for you! I... I won't let you do it!" Kari stammered.

The boy winced and turned to her, a pleading look in his eyes. She _could _stop him, and they both knew it. She had been able (with Sora's help) to guilt Tai into coming on this trip in the first place, and T.K. was well aware that he was no more resistant to her charms than the older boy was. During the time that they'd been together, she had established just how it would be between them.

"Kari, please don't. We've got to get them out of there. You've got this worked out as well as I do. Roan needs Tai to control that Greymon, and for God only knows what else. He doesn't need Matt and Sora. Who knows what he'll do, or when."

The girl bit her lip. _If _she agreed with T.K.'s theory (and she had to admit that it seemed likely), that each of these new children held crests that in opposition to their own and were used to influence the same types of Digimon, then Matt and Sora were definitely not in his plans. The Garurumon resting outside the cell door and the hatred that Roan had unleashed within their group earlier made that abundantly clear. Disturbingly enough, it also meant that lurking somewhere around here were corrupted clones of the rest of their Digimon.

She sighed. She worried for the boy, but also knew that if it was not the two of them, there would be no one to save their friends this time. "Okay. Do it," she conceded. T.K. nodded and turned to go, but she caught his shoulder and turned him around to face her once again. "Just be careful... please?" she begged, taking one of his hands and holding it to her lips.

His answer came accompanied by an unexpectedly sage and gentle smile. "Kari?"

"Yes?"

__

"I promise."


	4. Chapter IV

****

Chapter Four

"M... Matt?" began Sora quietly.

"Hmm?" the boy answered sullenly, still slumped against the wall with his knees cradled in his arms.

__

How do I even start this? What do I say?

The girl was about to open her mouth to speak again when the attention of each of the imprisoned teens was drawn to an unexpected, mad scrambling just outside their cell door. "Get him, fool!" the girl, whom their captor Daven had called 'Rio', shouted. A violent, feral howl was the immediate response to the command.

Sora and Matt rushed to the door to see what they could, then waited for a few moments in total silence until the clamor had passed while exchanging a quizzical glance. "What happened?" she whispered.

"Don't know."

"Matt? Sora?" a familiar voice whispered from just outside the door.

"Kari?" Matt echoed back at her.

"Uh huh," the other responded softly, and in another moment the door to the cell swung inwards. There was the younger girl, glancing over her shoulder with a worried look on her face and the shimmering Crest of Light in her hand. Matt stared at the open door. "How did you-- "

"The crests," Kari interrupted. "We found out that they open all the doors around this place. I think everybody here has one."

"Crests?" Sora returned, a bit puzzled.

"These people… they're evil, Sora," Kari continued quietly. She looked at the pair. "But I guess you figured that out by now. And they don't just use their crests to manipulate digimon, but people too. That's what happened to you two and Tai when we were back there with Roan. T.K. and I are almost sure that his crest makes people angry at one other."

Sora looked overwhelmed and very nearly bewildered, but Matt heard only his brother's name. "T.K.? Where is he?"

"Leading that girl Rio and her Garurumon away," the other, again looking pensively at the hallway down which she'd last seen the boy run. "It was the only way we could think of to get you free."

Sora frowned. "So they've _all _got Digimon?"

But the older boy was no longer listening, and instead turned and started to trot towards the hallway down which he had heard Rio and her partner chase his brother. "Matt? Where are you going?" Sora demanded.

"I told you before we got caught. I'm going after T.K."

"But Matt, they've got their Digimon and we don't," she protested. "What do you think you can do? We can't fight them like that."

Kari clearly agreed with Matt, but stopped before following him. The crest of Light glowed warm in her hand. "Wait, Matt!" she whispered urgently, looking down the hallway in the opposite direction that the older boy was headed. "This way. We'll get to him faster."

The two older children glanced at the talisman in the girl's hand and saw the truth in her eyes before nodding, allowing her to lead them further down the long corridor.

*****

T.K.'s breath was coming in hurried, ragged gasps as he scrambled through the narrow hallway. He could hear the furious pounding of the Garurumon's paws just at his heels and feel its hot, fetid breath upon his neck each time he slowed to round another bend. It was only because of the creature's awkward gait through such a narrow tunnel that he hadn't been caught already. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all...

"Might as well stop running now, little boy, and save us all some effort!" the dark-haired girl Rio shouted from somewhere behind him. "This beast of mine is hungry, and I'd like your help feeding him!"

The boy skidded around another corner when…"Oh, no!"

The deep crevice which he had warned Kari of earlier loomed before him in the darkness, and he was still moving towards it at full speed. It seemed to him that he heard voices calling his name from somewhere behind and above him, but didn't dare stop to hear what they were saying. Ten seconds and he would be at the lip of the cliff... now five seconds...

And then, just as he started to slip on the gravel near the edge, an idea occurred to him. The Garurumon was nipping at his heels now, but the boy had eyes only for the underground roots which penetrated the cavern floor directly in front of him. And at the last moment before he went over the edge, T.K. slipped on the gravelly floor and tumbled down, headfirst, towards the cliff. The Garurumon, unable to check its attack, snapped at him as it charged past... but then lost its own footing and tumbled, head-over-paws, into the crevice with a howling wail. In desperation, T.K. grabbed for the gnarled roots on the floor as he continued to slide ever closer to the precipice. But in the end his momentum was too great and carried him too far, and with a cry he followed the creature over the edge.

"T.K.!" screamed Matt and Kari in unison from their position at another entrance to the cavern, elevated above the other. The young girl turned away from what she'd just seen and buried her face into his shoulder, her heart feeling as if it had just burst within her chest. The older boy could only look on in a stunned silence, placing his arm around Kari's shoulder and holding her close.

Then, below them on the cavern floor, they heard the sound of several enraged oaths being called down upon T.K.'s head. The one called Rio had entered the cave just behind her canine beast and had watched the scene, and was now swearing furiously over the loss of her partner. "Damned child!" she spat, raging after the young boy. "Stupid mewling little _bastard_!"

Sora's lips quivered in silence as she looked at Kari and Matt. The younger girl's knees were trembling so badly that she would obviously have collapsed to the ground if Matt were not there to hold her on her feet.

Sora suddenly felt uncomfortably cold, as if a river of ice had replaced the hot blood in her veins. When she looked down and saw the one who had been responsible for T.K.'s death now cursing him, something snapped within her. And so it was with a severe and conscious slowness that she left the pair and hopped down to the other girl's level. She said not a word as she walked deliberately up to the other, then doubled up a fist and smashed it into Rio's face. A gush of blood exploded from the older girl's nose and the Crest of Apathy dropped from her unfeeling fingers as she collapsed backwards to the floor, quite unconscious.

Sora could barely see though the tears as she stared down at the offensive talisman and forcefully stomped down upon it, grinding the dark charm into pieces. Then she stumbled back away from the edge of the chasm and, with no one to support her, crumpled to her hands and knees in grief. But then, after a moment or so of emotional anguish, the tears began to trail off, for she was certain that she'd heard a choked, panting sound coming from the region where T.K. had fallen. Matt and Kari must have heard it too, for as one they hopped off the crag, rushed to the edge and peered over.

There was T.K. The root that he'd grabbed had broken off and was still dangling loosely from his arm, but apparently it had slowed him just enough to prevent him from falling further than the narrow ledge beneath the cliff. The young boy was looking down into the depths sorrowfully.

"T... T.K.?" Kari murmured in disbelief, as if she dared not believe what her own eyes told her.

"Hi Kari," he answered simply, obviously ignorant of what the others thought had occurred. He then turned and looked back sadly over the edge. "My hat."

Kari didn't know whether to laugh or to cry. In the end, what came out of her throat was a rather hiccupping mixture of both. It was another moment later and with the aid of some more of the cave roots that Matt and Sora had hauled the boy back up to the edge of the cliff. Matt hugged his brother warmly for a time before Kari removed him from the embrace.

"You... you promised you'd be careful," she chided him, tears in her eyes.

T.K. managed a weak grin. "It was either grab the root and fall or get eaten by a hungry Garurumon. I figured falling was the more careful alternative." He ran his fingers through his blond, now very dirty hair. "And I lost my hat."

Kari collapsed against the boy in relief, resting her forehead on his shoulder and replacing his fingers in his hair with her own. "Tell you what -- when we're out of here I promise that I'll get you a new one. Just not green this time, okay?"

*****

Tai stared intently at the monster before him, his eyes locked with those of the beast. The thick, hulking creature before him would never substitute for the friend that he'd left back in the digital world... but still, it _was_ a Greymon and he was certain that he could control it. It had stopped its incessant roaring when Tai had come into the room where it was shackled, and was now studying the boy just as intently as he was studying it.

Roan directed a clandestine nod at Ian, who continued to lurk nearby and was flanked by his Kabuterimon. Tai was as good as theirs. Soon he would teach them how to make these Digimon evolve to their higher forms, something that their benefactor had assured them could be done. For he had told them that the stronger the bond forged between them became, the more abilities they would learn. And now, with Tai and the Greymon on his side, nothing could stop him.

Tai looked back over his shoulder at Roan, concern etched on his face. "We're just going to do this for everyone's good, right?"

Roan tried his best to look offended and moved to put an arm around the younger boy's shoulders. "Of course, Tai! And being who we are _obligates _us to do so. We cannot just stand idly by while the authorities in this world turn a blind eye to the threats that we both know exist. If this is the only way that they can be made to listen and believe... then so be it."

There was a spark kindled somewhere within Tai's brain… something that he had not felt for some time. Certainly not since his encounter with Piedmon's spirit, but perhaps even before then. Once again he would be respected and have his voice acknowledged... once again his strength would countermand the fear. The Kabuterimon was undoing the Greymon's chains as it and Tai continued to stare at one another. When finally the chains fell away, Tai motioned the creature over to his side.

He could again feel the power of courage coursing through his body, fearless and secure in his domination of the creature. Then, at his command, the Digimon picked him up and placed him upon its shoulder. He felt like a king.

It was then that Leiko slunk, unseen, into the room and grabbed Roan by the shoulder. Urgently she pulled him lower and started to whisper into his ear.

"What?" he hissed in disbelief, his teeth clenched together in an angry scowl.

The girl cringed away from obsessive teen. "Rio has been captured and her creature killed," she repeated, slowly inching her hand from his shoulder lest it irritate him further.

"That's not possible!"

"I'm swear it to you, Roan, I saw it with my own eyes! At her command it was trying to kill the youngest boy, but he eluded it and the creature fell into the canyon."

Even from her position several feet away she could hear the grinding of his teeth. "Where is Daven?"

"Standing watch at the entrance. Rio wanted to make sure that none of the others escaped."

Roan snorted. "She had enough sense to do that, at least. Listen, I want you to take Ian and find those children. Kill them. Kill them quickly and then get back here."

"But what about Rio? They must have her with them."

The adolescent turned, his dark eyes burning the words into her soul like a brand. "Kill them _all_. If Rio should happen to be in the way… well, without her creature she's very little good to us anyway. She will not be missed."

*****

"Matt this is crazy!" whispered Sora, panting as she peeked up at the boy who stood on the walkway above her. She had lead the Kabuterimon here at his insistence, but what he intended to do now truly did border on lunacy.

Matt bit his lip, his eyes shifting away from hers. "I know. God knows how I know. But it's too late to worry about that now, and there's no other way that I can think to do this. Now get over there with Kari and T.K. and try to keep them quiet -- especially T.K. -- if something should go… wrong… here."

His lips were trembling; the look in his eyes terrified, but resolved. He could hear the buzzing wings of the enormous insect-creature in the corridor beneath him. "Now go!" he hissed.

Sora hesitated for one moment more, then gave in and went to join the younger two on the narrow ledge which had saved T.K.'s life only an hour earlier. Matt nodded and closed off all of his senses to concentrate on hearing the beating wings. He knew that sound almost by heart; had heard it all of those times when fighting shoulder to shoulder beside Izzy in the other world. But this would require better than split second timing…

Then he hurled himself off the edge on which he'd stood and onto the shoulders of the creature passing beneath him. The Kabuterimon lost its equilibrium and veered wildly at the sudden change of weight, and before it could adjust, Matt had wrapped the belt that he had taken from Sora around its throat with both hands and pulled hard.

A gasp came from the creature as it struggled for breath, its pincer-like hands reaching up in a desperate effort to pry the leathery strap from its neck. In its throes it circled higher and higher in the large cavern, until they were so far above the ground that Matt was forced to duck for fear that his head would strike the ceiling. Frantically he began kicking at one of the insect-like wings where it joined with the creature's body, desperate to keep it from rising any further.

The creature exhaled another gasp as Matt's attacks on its fragile wing finally had the desired effect, breaking the limb at the base. The Digimon instantly plummeted from the air in an unmanageable spiral while choking feverishly and still wheezing desperately for breath. Matt, meanwhile, continued to hold tightly to the belt, which at the moment was serving both as his weapon and his lifeline. As the two approached the ground at a horrific speed, the boy gave the leather strap one final, tremendous yank and caused the creature to veer wildly into the unyielding portion of the cave atop which Matt had stood to initially ambush it.

The blond boy was hurled from the creature's back by the impact and felt his body slam into the cavern wall, the violent collision jarring his bones and rattling his teeth. He tumbled to the floor in a shower of debris and lay there quite motionless for a moment before finally glancing up, blood from a cut above his eye trickling down his face. The Kabuterimon lay opposite him on the cavern floor, its insect wings still fluttering in instinctive action that belied the fact that the creature was wholly dead.

Then he took notice of a single, taunting clapping sound coming from the entrance opposite him. Struggling to his hands and knees, he looked past the blood to the dark girl who had lead them to this in the first place, the one called Leiko. At her side loomed an enormous Togemon, its color scheme appearing as awkward to his eyes as all the others had. "That was certainly creative," she said, leering at him as if he were a piece of meat at market. "You know, before I thought that you were simply an obnoxious little boy like the other. Now if I had known that you were capable of something like _this_..."

The Digimon at her side was stomping its "feet" and looking him over anxiously, its hollow eyes unnerving to the boy like they had never been in the other world. Leiko frowned, turning on the creature and extended her hand towards it, crest included. A glimmer of dark power sprung forth from the talisman and struck the monster in the back, injuring it mightily and sending it crumpling to the ground. In another moment, the sound of the creature's tortured whimpering filled the cavern.

She exhaled a snort as she smirked at the fallen boy. "These creatures are _so _difficult to maintain sometimes. But enough pain usually does the trick. As I was saying, its too bad that I didn't get to know you better before Roan decided to have you killed. We might have had some fun together. But since you've done me the enormous favor of getting rid of that bitch Rio, it may be that his attention will finally come to me."

Now she walked over to her partner's rear. "Get up!" she hissed, kicking it in a spot where she could find no needles growing. "Or I'll do at lot worse than that!"

Matt groaned and lay back on the floor, the blood from his cut now almost totally obscuring his vision. _At least T.K. and the others will be safe._

"Oh, and if you're wondering about your group of friends under the edge of the cliff over there, I'll get to them just as soon as I'm done with you." She turned to her partner. "Now get him!"

The Togemon started towards the boy on the ground and then stopped, turning to look at her mistress. "What are you looking at?" Leiko demanded, taking a step backwards. "I said go!" And she punctuated the shouted command with another explosive burst from her crest.

The Digimon cringed as the dark energy again permeated its body, then glanced from the boy to the girl and back again. Then, with what sounded like a sob, it turned and rushed at Leiko, grabbing her in its gloved hands and locking her in a deadly embrace while the jagged quills drove deep into her flesh. The girl screamed in shock and ghastly pain, but neither was destined to be long lived. With an almost joyful cry the abused Digimon tightened its grip and then turned and rushed to the edge of the chasm, hurling itself over the lip of the canyon into the depths below. Matt looked on in astonishment, and in only a moment the sounds of pain and triumph were gone, replaced by the still quiet of the cave.

"Matt?" whispered T.K. from his haven. The older boy was quite appreciative that his brother had not witnessed _that _particular scene.

"Yeah, T.K." he said, then paused for a moment. "I'm coming…"


	5. Chapter V

****

Chapter Five - The Reckoning

__

Where are they? Roan fumed as he watched Tai and the Greymon continue to become acclimated to one another. It had now been over two hours ago since he'd sent Leiko and Ian out into the caves with instructions to kill the other four, whether they held Rio or not, and now he was becoming concerned.

__

Could they have failed? It seemed a possibility too remote to even warrant consideration. If he was to believe what Leiko had told him (an uncertain decision at the best of times) then the youngest boy had caused the death of Rio's Garurumon, but he could imagine no circumstances under which the four of them, alone and unarmed, could have posed any trouble for the other two creatures as well. And while it was true that Ian was almost literally brainless and Leiko treacherous, he couldn't honestly see either of them failing him in this. _Nevertheless..._

He looked over at Tai. The anger in the younger boy had been building steadily since he and the creature had begun working together. The fear and shame that he'd been feeling before had now dissipated and (thanks in large part to Roan's influence) reformed as a condemnation of all those who he felt had failed him. _Everyone _had failed him, but his 'friends' in particular had failed to help, and that left them more guilty than most.

"Tai!" Roan called from below, his head craned backwards. "It is time. Time to find the others and tell them of your decision!"

The boy looked down from his position on the Digimon's shoulder and nodded once. He and the creature had bonded firmly into a master/servant relationship, as it had never done with the faint-hearted Cole before it had consumed him. Roan had hoped to have the other boy teach him the secret of making his own creature evolve before forced to test his new loyalty against that of his old friends, but some things simply could not wait. At least he still knew where Daven was, and would have the slender boy at his side to help him in case anything should go wrong.

"Good. Then come on. Let's go and get Daven to join us, to help in gathering them all together."

*****

"Jeez this guy's heavy!" Matt complained as he and T.K. struggled to drag the unconscious brute (who Rio had reluctantly told them was named Ian) into the chamber where the girl was now confined. "What'd you hit him with, anyway?"

Sora smiled at the older of the two blond-haired boys, a makeshift and now very blood-soaked bandage wrapped crookedly across the cut above his eye. "Well I didn't think you'd want him waking up before you got him in there," she returned, self-consciously tossing a rather large chunk of rock to the side. As the two boys struggled to drag the limp form the last few feet into the cell, Kari closely examined the crest they had taken from him.

__

Ignorance. Brutality. She could feel the ugliness of the spirit as it struck out at her from within the stone; a spirit so completely opposed to Izzy's benign virtue of knowledge. With a shudder she hurled it violently against the wall, shattering it into pieces. They had now accounted for three of the crests, as well as their three masters and Digimon. She had seen T.K. elude and inadvertently cause the death of the Garurumon. The body of the Kabuterimon that Matt had bested had vanished in front of her eyes, and the older boy had told them that the Togemon and its mistress had fallen together into the crevice.

There was a great deal more complaining on the part of the two boys, but in the end the pair managed to drag Ian's prone form into the same room where Rio was already detained. At that point the dark-haired girl moved as if to make for the exit, but then took one look at Sora and slunk back against the wall, a hand covering her nose. She'd been hit plenty of times before, ofttimes by Roan, who was of course immeasurably stronger than the young girl. But there was something that she'd seen in Sora's eyes when she thought that T.K. had died that chilled Rio's blood, and the older girl was clearly nervous about another confrontation. 

"Now tell," Sora demanded as she slammed the cell door shut behind them. "How many more of you are there? We know about Roan and Daven and Leiko. Are there any others?"

The older girl's brow furrowed into a scowl at the other, but after a moment she cringed back and shook her head once as a response. Kari almost sighed in relief at not having to face whatever perverse and twisted copies that this group could have come up with for the angels.

"That's still two more that we really can't handle," T.K. said glumly, and the others turned to look at him. He looked up at them. "Let's face it, there's only so many ways that we can stop them. It sure won't do any good to try to throw the Birdramon into that chasm, and Matt isn't going to be able to strangle the Ikkakumon."

"What about trying to stop the other kids?" Sora suggested. "That skinny one... Daven, was it? I think we could probably handle him if we could separate him from his digimon. If they use the crests to control them, couldn't we just take it from him and destroy it?"

The four all looked at one another for a moment, but it was Kari who finally responded. "I don't think that's the answer, Sora. They know we're out here and they're looking for us. If you were in danger, would you have left Biyomon's side? Those two are probably going to be attached at the hip with their digimon until this is all over."

Matt frowned, then looked at the younger girl and nodded. "Besides, we don't even know if we'd be that much better off having those things without someone to control them. It could be just as bad, or even worse, if they ended up going berserk or something like that. I think we really need Tai, whether he's still on our side or not."

The boy caught the sharp intake of breath at his side, and glanced down just as Kari turned her back on the rest of them. "He... he will be," she insisted in a quiet, wavering voice, closing her eyes and hiding her face against her shoulder.

Sora placed a sisterly arm around the girl's shoulders with care and lowered her voice as well. "We'd all like to believe that, Kari, but remember Tai's really never been the same since… since Piedmon. And Rio said that's been her brother's plan all along, to take Tai and manipulate his mind until he's little more than a slave to him. He's had a long time to plan this, and had to have thought he had a good chance at succeeding to even try. We just... we just have to be ready..."

The group fell silent for a few moments, each experiencing an uncomfortable moment of fear... both for and of their friend. Then Matt cleared his throat to break the spell that fear was threatening to complete over them all. "T.K.? I want you to stay here with Kari and make sure that nobody comes along and lets these two out of here, understand?"

The younger boy nodded, his blond hair falling in front of his eyes. "What about the two of you?"

Matt bit his lip and looked sideways to Sora. "We're going after Tai…"

*****

Roan clung tightly to the claw of his creature as it perched on the highest outcropping of rock near the ceiling of the cavern. There wasn't really much room for the Birdramon to maneuver in here, so he was forced to let Tai and his Greymon, as well as Daven, do most of the exploring.

__

I want you in his mind every second he's with you, he had told Daven, who was now riding on the Greymon's shoulder opposite Tai. _He is _not _their friend, he is _not _their leader. All along, he was just using them to guard his own safety, and now he's done with them. He wants what I've offered him; nothing more, nothing less. Finish what I've started in him, understand?_

The dark-haired teen grimaced impatiently as he watched the lumbering creature leave yet another of the corridors that led to other parts of the cavern and return again to this main one. That made four of the offshoots that they had checked, yet still no sign of Rio or Ian or Leiko or the any of the other children. Daven had confirmed that no one had left, and his creature still guarded the only exit to the place, so they had to be in here somewhere.

Then he heard a startled cry as two of the children emerged from the prison corridor. _Got them,_ he thought with a smirk. "Over there!" he shouted to the pair riding atop the Greymon.

Tai turned the creature with a single nod and it started towards his old friends. Roan watched intently. He knew the bond between the three of them had been immeasurably strong in the past. Had they done enough to dissolve it? From the discussions that the two of them had in the other rooms, he felt certain that the boy was slowly coming around to his way of thinking. But this was the test. Would he actually be twisted enough to induce the creature to attack them?

Matt and Sora stared up at Tai, who sat in haughty security atop the enormous creature's shoulder. Roan could 'hear' Daven throw one final threat of danger into the short-haired boy's mind, then watched him slide nimbly down the body and off the tail of the creature, obviously wanting no part in whatever confrontation was to come.

Tai glared in anger at the two figures in front of his creature. It was these two, or those just like them, who posed the greatest remaining threat to this world. They were weak, and as such could not, or would not, defend it against what was destined to happen. They were going to allow an influx of otherworldly evil to return, and do nothing to stop it. And the evil... the evil would then have its way with him again...

The sweat was heavy on his forehead. "I... I won't let that happen!" he murmured fervently to himself. "I _won't! _Anyone not part of this solution _is_ part of the problem..."

"Tai!" the boy on the floor shouted up at him, and he gave a brief pause at the familiarity in the voice that broke through the anger and panic that had been clouding his thoughts. _Matt. That... that's Matt._ And somewhere in the back of his mind he had vague impressions of a fierce rivalry with the blond-haired boy, yet also a sense of a deep and abiding friendship. Here was one with whom he had stood toe to toe at times, but with whom he had more often stood back to back. He had shown him what it meant to be an older brother, to be a friend, when at times it seemed he would have forgotten.

"Tai, please listen!" the girl shouted, her brown hair falling over her shoulders. The boy atop the Greymon's shoulders concentrated on her now, his eyes absorbed totally by her. Feelings of fear and of the need for action that seemed so important just a moment ago now suddenly felt almost inconsequential to him. The girl... she was missing something... what was it?

__

The hat. She wasn't wearing that ridiculous hat... "Sora..." he exhaled her name in a single breath, feeling a keen sense of heartache that a moment ago she had been out of his mind. He had known her seemingly forever, and had loved her almost as long... and yet still had never spoken of it. In his mind she had always personified both beauty and grace, yet it would have embarrassed him mightily to ever discuss such a thing with her.

__

My friends. His nerves calmed and his heartbeat slowed, and for the first time in what seemed like an eternity a lucid thought worked its way into his head. _Afraid...? Why? What do I have to be afraid of if they're all with me?_ Friends. Family. _My sister. My love. _Those were the important things. They'd all protected one another from the fear in the past, why should it be any different now? How had he ever forgotten…?

From the far side of the cavern, Roan teeth snapped shut in rage. Just like that, it was over. All this time spent trying to conceive the most perfect plan, ruined in that single moment. For even from his position at the crown of the cavern he could see the look of adoration on Tai's face as he stared intently at the one called Sora. Almost two years of planning on how to bring this about had been foiled by _that? Damn! _

I should have known… should have seen… He's in love with her.

He sighed, the looked up at his enormous avian beast with a single thought in his mind. The firebird soared off its perch in response to his desire and started to circle about the ceiling of the cavern, its master clinging tightly to its claw.

"I commend you, then!" Roan shouted down to the trio beneath him. "You three have overcome what has brought ruin upon dozens of people since we escaped from that camp so long ago. I regret that we couldn't come to some sort of arrangement, but I now see that it would be impossible. So I'm afraid that I must bid you all farewell!"

Matt, Sora and Tai looked up at the other, somewhat afraid but also defiant and secure in knowing that they were all together again. Roan smiled evilly and gave the claw which he was holding a slap. "Birdramon! Meteor Swarm!" he called to the bird.

Flaming balls hurled down towards them, and Matt snatched Sora's hand and dove for cover behind a rock as the barrage was unleashed. The girl gasped in astonishment before Matt pulled her head down and shielded her body with his own. This was not the Birdramon's attack that she was used to, the simple but still dangerous Meteor Wing. This was a deadly and continuous bombardment of flaming rock and debris. The missiles shattered the cave walls and boulder around them, sending chips of stone flying into their hair and skin. "Tai!" screamed Sora at the boy who still sat atop the Greymon in the middle of the maelstrom.

He turned and winked at her, then gave a smile of confidence as her heart went out to him. She could see that he was once again whole, once again the leader that they had known during their time in the digital world, no longer tainted by Piedmon or any trace of insanity or fear.

"Roan!" Tai screamed out a challenge, and the Greymon did the same in an unintelligible roar. One of the flaming missiles clipped the creature on the shoulder opposite where Tai sat, but it merely seemed to enrage him further. "Nova Blast!" he shouted to his new partner, and the creature exhaled his fiery assault in response. Roan and his Birdramon nipped to the side, but the shot had not been aimed at them. With an earshattering explosion the blast ripped into the roof of the cave and sent a cascade of rocks showering down within the cavern. One particularly large boulder clipped the firebird on the wing, and with a cry it started to spiral downward... each desperate flutter bringing it closer to its enemy.

Roan leapt from the bird's claw as they passed near the ground, rolling to a stop near the battlefield. Tai also left his perch to confront the older boy as their two partners now went into battle on a more equal footing.

Roan was on his feet as Tai approached, the older boy wiping a trail of blood from his lips with the back of his hand. "You could have had anything… everything!" he hissed, springing upon the other and pummeling him with harsh blows to the body and chest.

"Tai!" Matt and Sora shouted, rushing to their friend's aid. Roan glanced back over his shoulder at the pair, but as he looked away Tai gave an ugly grimace and from his position on the ground caught the teen with a kick to the back of his knee. Roan's leg folded up underneath him and put him down, but the older boy's punches had left Tai weakened and momentarily unable to follow up.

Over on the far side of the cavern the two Digimon remained locked in deadly struggle for life. On equal footing now the Greymon seemed to be getting the better of the fight, but its left arm was dangling uselessly by its side, the flesh on its shoulder seared by the Birdramon's initial barrage.

Then the evil avian creature caught a lucky blow, as its wing swept the Greymon's feet from underneath it and sent the saurian behemoth crashing to the ground. Within a moment the Birdramon had pounced on its fallen opponent and started to shred the dinosaur's rough, knobby flesh with its horrendously sharp beak. The Greymon exhaled a roar of pain and turned to look about in desperation for its new master. Tai was still down, unable to offer any assistance, and the creature knew if it should lose the fight that its new master, its first friend, would be beyond any assistance.

Then the monster did the only thing it could think of, or had strength left to do. With a mighty blast of breath it unleashed a last bolt of fire towards the ceiling of the cavern. Once again the flames shattered the roof and brought down a crash of boulders, burying both it and the Birdramon in a ton of rubble. The evil avian creature was killed in an instant, but the Greymon still had the strength to crane its head, the one part of its body not crushed by the tons of rock towards the first, and only, friend that it would ever had. The last thought that it had before it released its spirit was that it had finally found someone to love…someone to die for.

*****

Matt crashed hard into the back of Tai's opponent, grabbing him around the waist with both arms and tackling him off the boy. Roan careened backwards and bounced once on the hard floor before rolling to a stop at the cavern's stone wall. He had seen his creature buried below the massive stone avalanche, and could not hope to fight these three all at once, alone. He thought briefly of calling for Daven, but was sure that the other would not come to his aid. The scheming dipsomaniac had never been a friend, only an opportunist... and he was unlikely to see any benefit to self in continuing to serve Roan now.

Then a perverse thought started to percolate in the dark teen's twisted mind. He could no longer hope to win this fight or seize the power that had offered, but he _could _have his revenge. With a sharp gasp of pain at finding one of his ribs cracked the boy dragged himself to his feet and started a slow limp towards the last corridor from the main cavern. The three children watched him as he went... at least until Daven appeared in the cavern with his Ikkakumon in tow. He snorted as he looked down at the pile of rubble that had buried the two champion Digimon, though their bodies were already beginning to dissolve.

"I guess that leaves me to clean up the mess," he leered at the three, a wicked glower adorning his face. It had occurred to him now, even in the midst of his drunken haze, that he was the only one left with a digimon. And that put him firmly in charge at the moment.

Then an explosive burst of red flames burned from the corridor down which Roan had run, permeating the cavern with the thick, sickening smell of hot sulfur. Moments later the oldest boy's terrified scream was cut short by a horrendous gurgle. Daven gaped at the hallway in sotted disbelief and terror. "He didn't!" he gasped incredulously, his knees buckling and collapsing underneath him. "For the love of God, he couldn't!"

The eyes of Sora, Matt and Tai were locked in an unblinking apprehension on the thick, caliginous air billowing forth from the corridor. It was only a few breathless moments later when the unspoken fears of each became a nightmarish reality as two wraithlike forms wafted forth from within, a ghastly evil radiating from the pair and pervading the cavern. Sora gave a cry of terror and involuntarily collapsed to her knees while the boys at her side could do little more than stand quite still in a hesitant sort of inaction.

They had seen and beaten devilish and demonic types of Digimon in the past, but none of those battles could have prepared them for the horror that they now saw: the twisted and wicked replicas of the angels that had saved their lives so many times in the other world. The wings of both were a dull metallic gray in both color and substance, and the eyes of each were not so much dark as they were hollow or empty... two skeletal pairs of unblinking sockets that existed completely without being.

"The f…fallen angels!" gasped Daven, staggering backwards in horror as he reached vaguely towards his digimon partner. "Stop them!" he commanded.

The mammoth sea creature obeyed and unleashed an airborne torpedo upon the pair, but the male angel simply glanced back in a bored sort of contempt and brushed the explosive projectile to the side with a single claw-like appendage. A tangle of filthy hair and saber-like fangs framed the creature's cruel visage as his vision narrowed on his attacker. _"Hades Thorn Barrage!"_ the female screeched at his side, extending each of her cruelly barbed claws at Daven. Wave upon wave of darts of vile darkness sprung from those digits and struck the fragile boy repeatedly in the chest, hurling his body some dozen feet into the air before finally petering off and allowing him to crash limply to the ground.

__

"Sheol Nebula..." the male intoned in a low, sibilant voice while pointing at the Ikkakumon. The creature stood motionless for a moment, helpless without the direction of its master. But at the call of the angel a throbbing pentagram of darkness opened at the feet of the sea creature and enveloped the beast into a black, bottomless abyss.

With Daven and his partner gone, the two angels then turned and advanced on Tai, Matt and Sora. The odor of sulfur in the air that surrounded the three was almost overpowering now, gagging them, and together they shrunk away from that foundation of ultimate evil... but then, quite suddenly, Tai was on his feet and standing protectively in front of his friends, his knees quivering beneath him. Without any hope of withstanding the creatures and with his body still aching he stood and spread his arms out wide. "Get... get back! Get out of here!" he shouted futilely.

A booming laugh emitted from the swollen lips of the male angel, then was echoed by the sinister, banshee screech of the female as well. "Naive fool!" he hissed, then pointed his index finger at the three. _"Sheol--"_

"Stop!" a sharp, clear voice challenged from the side of the cavern, and quite suddenly Tai, Matt and Sora found the dark angels' line of attack barred by a radiant light. A calming, beautiful feeling permeated Tai's entire being as the glow from the light that guarded them washed over him, and he knew that had seen it somewhere before…

The three turned as one and looked to the source of the shouted command. T.K. and Kari had entered the cavern and were standing, hand-in-hand, at the exit to the corridor that they had been guarding. Even at the great distance Matt and Tai could see the bands that held the crests of Hope and Light dangling from their sibling's conjoined hands, and Tai instantly recognized the significance of the fusion as an absolute ward against evil. The one time he had seen it before, it had served to exorcise Piedmon's spirit from his own body.

The eyes of the younger boy flitted over to the fallen angels, who glared back in hatred. A deafening silence fell over the cavern as the creatures stared down the younger pair, though they were obviously loathe to attack. "Begone!" T.K. suddenly demanded of the pair, and through some trick of acoustics or for some other reason his soft voice suddenly took on the intensity of a shouted command that was punctuated with great authority. The angels reared back at the sound, as if in pain.

"We defy you!" called Kari, the look in her brown eyes turning from affectionate to abhorrent as they left T.K. to fall upon the dark creatures. "And you _know _that we are proof against you. Abandon this place! Leave us alone now!"

At the exact instant of the girl's words and with a great howling of desperation from the angels, the light from the fusion flared brightly, exploding out from the clasped hands of the young pair.

It was only a moment later when a short period of bedazzlement from the light passed for the group and they were again able to open their eyes. Tai glanced around in fleeting alarm, only to find that the dark angels (along with the sickening odor) had vanished. T.K. and Kari waited another moment to be certain the danger had passed, then allowed their hands to drop to their sides. Slowly and solemnly they replaced their respective crests around their necks while the young boy sighed in relief and inched closer to the girl. He glanced sideways at her, his knees trembling so violently at the risk that they'd just taken that he thought he might collapse. "Did you _really _know that was going to work?" he murmured to her as they approached the others.

The girl only smiled in response.


	6. Chapter VI

Epilogue

Tai sat unaccompanied on the shore of the lake, watching the silent motions of the waves on the water as they gently ventured up the sand to lick at his bare toes. The full moon was halfway through its journey across the night sky, and he wanted some time alone to reflect on everything that had happened.

They had left the cave early the previous morning after freeing the two surviving miscreants from their makeshift prison cell. Neither Rio nor Ian had seen fit to confront their jailers in any way, and so had simply left the cave without causing a scene. The five had debated long and hard about what to do with the only body that remained, that of the gaunt boy Daven, and in time decided to simply leave him where he had fallen and depart themselves. Telling someone at least where to find him had been brought up as a possibility, but in the end rejected. Certainly no one would believe them if they had told what had actually happened there, and making up any kind of story for this would have been simply too complicated. Before leaving they did, however, strip him of the crest of Duplicity. They all agreed that it was much too dangerous to be left lying around.

They had also conducted a brief search to see if they could find out what had happened to Roan and the crest of Hatred, but could find no trace of him or his body. They all assumed that he had met his death while freeing the dark angels from their prison, but in any event had no desire to spend any large amount of time in the caverns to confirm that possibility.

Tai was finally satisfied. His friends had brought him to this place to abolish his fear and restore his faith in himself, and in a unexpectedly complex way that was what had happened. All that time he had been afraid that Piedmon's presence in his body had corrupted him, had left him somehow more susceptible to evil, but his rejection of Roan's domination had helped him realize that he was the same boy that he'd always been. Perhaps even a bit stronger, and maybe wiser.

He sighed. He'd hurt his friends more by burying himself in his depression than he had by being Piedmon's tool in the attack on them. He realized that much now, and the fact that during the previous month they'd stood by him instead of reacting as they had every right to made him feel even closer to them all.

"Tai?"

He smiled to himself. He felt closest of all to her. Glancing over his shoulder he saw Sora approach on bare feet, a thin robe wrapped around her shoulders. "Shouldn't you be asleep?" she asked.

"Actually, this is the first time in a long while that I've really felt awake," he answered quietly. "It'd been like a bad dream for the longest time. I thought I'd take a little while to appreciate it."

She nodded, sitting down next to him. "You really had us scared there for a while."

Her words disheartened the boy a bit, and turned his face to let her see it. "I thought you guys said you never had any doubt that I was still on your side."

She stifled a giggle. "Not about that, Tai. Because you were torturing yourself all that time. It just wasn't the same without the old you around. I... we all missed you."

He looked into her eyes. For just the briefest moment, he thought he'd heard something in those words that she hadn't exactly said. She blushed under his close examination and turned away for a moment, then put on the bravest face that she could and looked back. She bit off a nervous chuckle. "If I'd known how hard this was going to be…"

The boy cleared his throat. "Sora… I think... no, I _know _that I've got something that I have to tell you."

"I know. I've got something to tell you too, but I don't know exactly how to say it."

__

Why is this always so easy for T.K. and Kari? he wondered. He knew what he wanted to say, he'd known it for years, but always before when it had come time he had tripped and fallen over the words. But why? Being nervous in the face of an enemy was perhaps understandable, but her...?

Still, he was barely able to look at her. "Sora? I... I love you," he murmured quickly, then turned his face away from her and bowed his head like a very young child. "There. I said it."

Sora smiled sadly. To spare them both much heartache she'd hoped that he didn't feel that way, though in truth it would have crushed her if he hadn't. She reached out and gently brushed her fingers against his cheek. "And Tai? I love you too." She paused, wondering if she could say what she still must. Then she swallowed. "I love you too, but…"

He turned, startled. "But?"

She closed her eyes against the pain. She had dreaded this moment for several long months. "I… I think I love Matt too."

Tai's bottom jaw was almost on his chest, and Sora bowed her head in shame at the look on betrayal in his eyes. "I'm sorry Tai. So sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen; I didn't mean to fall in love with either of you. You both deserve so much more than me. I try to tell myself to stop, that I'll ruin whatever I have with both of you, but I just can't! It…it hurts…"

She was crying. And as much as the boy wanted to feel devastated at that moment, he simply couldn't. Not when he saw how hurt she was, and how much courage it had taken for her to make that honest admission. She had stood by him in his time of crisis even when she'd had every right to feel wronged by his words. If he truly loved her, how could he do less?

He slid a comforting arm around her shoulders. It was in no way a romantic gesture, as that was not what was appropriate at the moment. "Sora? I feel like I should say I'm sorry, but I guess I'm not. I _do _love you, but Matt's my friend and a great guy, too. If I have to lose you to anyone…"

She shrugged off his arm in frustration and rolled onto her hands and knees, her head bowed and her hands balled up in the sandy earth. "Tai stop! It's not fair… not fair that you're both like this. How can you both be so different one minute and then so alike the next?"

"Maybe you bring out the best in us?"

She was almost choking on her tears. He took both her hands in his and pulled her close, looking closely at her face and downcast eyes. "Sora? If you're saying that you have to choose between us, all I can do is swear that I'll wait for you. And even though my promises may not carry as much weight as T.K.'s do, I promise that if in the end it's Matt, you'll always have my friendship… and so will he."

"Tai… I can't take this. Please, just… just kiss me."

He looked troubled, then bent down to do as she had requested. But the kiss that he offered was not one born of passion, but instead of a comforting friendship. She looked up, startled, as his lips gently brushed hers. His eyes were kind, caring… perhaps even a little bit wise, and she the look on her face became somewhat curious as he wiping the tears from her cheek. "Thanks... thanks, Tai," she whispered.

The other's face was lit up with a boyish grin, betraying no hint of the very mature decisions he'd just made. "C'mon, let's get back to camp," he said, the girl to her feet. "We've still got a good four days of this vacation left and I guess I've wasted too much of it already."

*****

Matt opened his eyes a crack as Tai entered the tent they were sharing with T.K, and his face betrayed a somber expression. He knew that the other boy had been with Sora, and while that knowledge might have ordinarily been disquieting to him... at the moment, it just didn't seem to bother him quite so much. Tai was back with them and was finally whole again. _That _was what mattered. He leaned up on his elbows. "Tai?"

"Matt?" the other answered in a low voice.

The blond-haired boy smiled at his friend, and nodded in satisfaction. "It's good to have you back, Tai."

"Thanks, Matt. For everything. I'm sorry for putting you all through this."

The other boy's face betrayed a small, playful grin. "Eh. Demons, dinosaurs, cave-ins, power hungry madmen. What are friends for, right?"

Tai responded with a lighthearted punch to the shoulder and a smile, then plopped down hard on his pillow.

***

Sora tried to ease into the tent without waking Kari, but the younger girl had always been a light sleeper and came fully awake. She rolled into a sitting position and wrapped her arms around her knees. "What'd he say?" she asked, looking up at the other..

"What did who say?" Sora replied in her most nonchalant tone of voice, keeping her back to the other under the pretext of arranging the pillows to her liking. She could probably have used a confidant, but wasn't so certain that Kari was the best or most impartial nominee for the job.

Kari didn't answer the question, and smiled at Sora's back instead. "They're both waiting for you, you know, but you don't have to rush things. Even if neither of them is exactly patient, this is something that's too important to do too quickly. It'll take some time, but I think one of them will make perfect sense to you in the end."

Sora turned and peered quizzically at the younger girl. _How can she possibly be such a child one moment and so full of insight the next?_ "Aren't you going to stick up for your brother?"

Kari shrugged. "I will if you decide he's the right one," she answered simply, then laid her head back down on the pillow.

Sora lay down and closed her eyes as well, but could not manage to sleep for the longest time. Being in love with two boys at once haunted her, as did knowing that she could have whichever one she chose the moment she said the word. _How perfectly wonderful… how terribly sad…_


	7. Sora's Choice

Sora's Choice

Sora's chin rested on her folded arms as she lay in bed and watched the morning sun slowly materialize over the horizon, and at the sight she surrendered a melancholic sigh. It was finally here. Her sixteenth birthday had come, and all of her friends would soon be arriving to help her celebrate her transition from girl to young woman. In the past she'd had reason enough to hope that it would be an exceptionally happy day for her, but now that it had was here she could easily foresee the heartbreaking fiasco that this day was likely to bring.

It had been five months, almost to the day, since she had made her fateful decision. The night after she and four of the other children had stopped the criminal Roan and his gang of miscreants from assailing the world with their dark digimon, she had given in to emotion and acknowledged her romantic love for two of her best friends. Each of the boys, in turn, had readily confessed to the same feelings, only to be stunned into silence moments later when told that he had a rival for her affections.

She sighed and fell face forward onto the bed, covering her head with her pillow. They both could have made it much easier by not being so understanding about her predicament, by yelling or just by saying _something_ mean, but each had promised that they would wait on whatever decision she made.

Of course that had been almost half a year ago, and the impatient nature of each was beginning to get the better of them... though to humor her they were doing their best to hide it. As a matter of fact, all of her friends seemed somewhat baffled by what had to be perceived as flightiness on her part. Well, all except for Kari, she amended.

The younger girl had advised her to wait until she was sure, no matter how long that took. _Easy for her to say, _Sora thought almost grudgingly. _She's already got T.K. wound around her little finger._

That much was unmistakably true. These days it was an increasingly uncommon sight for the younger two to be seen apart from one another, and they were slowly breaking their parents into the idea that they were somewhat more than good friends.

And, to possibly make matters even worse, Mimi had kept her promise and was now back in the country for her winter break. As soon as Izzy had let the headstrong girl in on what was happening, she became doggedly determined to see Sora become "official" with one of the boys before she had to leave again. Just which of the two didn't seem to matter to her in the least.

Sora hadn't necessarily appreciated the other girl's input. _"You've gotten too wrapped up in those romance novels Mimi," _she'd snapped at one particularly upsetting moment. _"It just doesn't always work out like that!"_

The girl sighed again, then rolled out of her bed. Any more sleep seemed out of the question with her thoughts racing away from her as they were, and she wanted a bath before her friends arrived anyway. She went to the tub and turned on the warm water, pouring a minute amount of bubble bath in as well. Her mother had already left for work, leaving behind a note that she would be home late that night but would take the girl out for dinner as a celebration.

Sora stayed in the tub for a long time, soaking and relaxing... but mainly thinking. So that the other could move on, she'd almost promised Matt and Tai resolution by today... and still she had not come through with it. She glanced at the clock on the wall. _Nine o'clock._ The others would be arriving any minute, and of course, she still had nothing new to tell them about the… situation.

The girl wrapped one towel around her auburn hair to dry it and another lengthwise around her body, then left for her bedroom to find something appropriate to wear for the party. She was closing the bathroom door behind her when she heard a familiar voice from the living room couch. "Sora? Is that you? Nobody answered when we knocked so we sort of… let… ourselves… ah..."

Matt's voice trailed off as he caught sight of her, then Tai turned to see exactly what had made his friend stop in such a manner. "Eeek!" Sora shrieked, clutching the towel tightly around her. The look on each of the boy's faces was one of astonishment and incredulity. "Close your eyes!" she shouted at the pair with angry indignity.

Neither of the two obeyed the heated demand, but each gave the other a half-hearted shove in response to it. "Yeah... close your eyes," they each echoed to the other in perfect unison. The brown eyes of Tai, in particular, seemed to be doing a bit more roaming than was good for them.

__

"Oooh!" the girl fumed, then furiously stomped through her bedroom door and slammed it shut behind her.

She could hear an almost instantaneous argument ensue as the door closed at her back. "See! I told you we should have waited!" Tai shouted.

"_What? _What are you talking about? It was _your _idea to come over here early in the first place!"

"Not me! Kari just wanted me out of the way so she could have some time alone with T.K.! And you were the one that said 'Oh, she won't mind. Look, she even left the door unlocked.' "

Sora was fuming as she rifled through her closet to find something to wear, forgoing her earlier plans to find something appropriate for an important occasion such as her birthday. Throwing on the first set of clothes she found that didn't seem to clash too horribly, the girl threw open the door and burst back into the living room. Her hair was still quite wet, and dangled in long tendrils in front of her eyes while her breath came in rapid, seething gasps as she glanced sternly from one boy to the other.

After a long moment, during which neither Matt nor Tai seemed inclined to even look at her, the girl snapped. "Well? Don't either of you have anything to say for yourselves?"

Tai had been working on what he hoped was a charming smile. Nervously he threw it her way and stammered in a light-hearted voice, "Uhm... Nice towel?"

Sora's teeth snapped shut, and an alarmed Tai observed the smoking cinders of her eyes as they erupted into raging bonfires. He took one nervous half-step backwards before his attention was drawn to the girl's hands as they stiffened into quivering talons and started to stretch towards his throat. 

Like a tigress stalking her prey, Sora moved slowly around the couch in Tai's direction while he nervously backed away. And then the boy bolted in alarm, increasing his stumbling pace in fear as the irate girl reached for him. Matt hurled himself out of the way, leaving Tai the sole focus of the girl's wrath. "Sora! Sora, please! I was just kidding!" the brown-haired boy shouted desperately.

A light knock sounded from the front door, and Izzy entered with Mimi on his arm. The two had been seeing each other casually since the girl's return, though both knew that she had to leave eventually and thus carefully avoided making any serious commitments. "Oh, don't tell me you started the party without us!" the girl protested, and the pursuit was broken off momentarily.

Izzy surveyed the scene frozen in front of him: Sora's hands, extended into claws, were reaching for Tai's neck as Matt cowered on the ground well away from the two. Sora was still breathing quite heavily, and her eyes were still wild and narrowed dangerously at the boys. "Uhm… I like what you've done with your hair," he ventured hesitantly, breaking the awkward silence.

Another moment brought Sora back to her senses, and instantly the girl turned on her heel, gave a disheartened sigh and went off to her room, slamming the door behind her. Mimi dropped Izzy's arm and followed. "Sora, wait! If it's about your hair let me help! I've got some fabulous new idea on what we can do with it--"

Izzy glanced at his two friends, who were both looking quite sheepish after all the commotion. "So who'd she pick?" he asked.

*****

Mimi grinned in delight while her fingers worked their way through Sora's hair, the younger girl determined to discover a way to arrange it that would leave the two jealous suitors slack-jawed with longing. The older girl sighed while submitting herself to the makeover, bowing her head in dismay before the other rather forcefully pulled it back to where she needed it. "Mimi, this isn't going to work," Sora groused, hoping that it didn't sound like she was whining. "My hair just doesn't work like yours does. You can twist yours around just about anyway you want and it looks great, but mine…"

The younger girl continued to concentrate at the mirror in front of them. "It'll be fine, Sora. We'll figure something out. After all, you've got to look your best for that pair of Romeos out there, right?" She frowned as the braid she was working on just didn't seem to fit Sora's personality, and unwound it to begin again.

"Oh, Mimi just grow up!" the older girl huffed in response, though she felt instantly guilty about doing so. Her outburst shouldn't have been directed at Mimi (who after all was just trying to help) but she felt that she just _had _to yell at somebody.

The younger girl looked hurt, almost crestfallen with a look of betrayal on her face. Her hands went limp and dropped from Sora's hair as her eyes drifted downward. Sora blinked in surprise. "Uh, Mimi… I'm sorry if I hurt--"

Suddenly, unexpectedly, the younger girl threw her arms around her friend and started weeping feverishly, burying her face into Sora's shoulder. The older of the two was startled, and embraced the other tightly in concern for her. "Mimi? What… what's wrong?"

Mimi sniffed, and her lips were trembling as she looked up. "That... that's the second time since I've been back that you've told me to grow up, Sora. And I know that, to you at least, I must seem to be acting pretty silly about the whole thing, but I'll tell you the truth... I'd give anything to be less grown up than I am right now. _Anything_. I don't think I can take it anymore."

"Huh?"

"You just don't understand, any of you. You've all got each other, people to talk to about… about what happened to us all. But I've got no one. I try to tell people at my school about the things that we all went through, the sacrifices we made, our friends who died trying to save us, but they don't... they _can't_ understand. All the girls in my class ever want to talk about is the latest musical group of teenage boys or the latest fashions in those stupid magazines, and it's killing me Sora! It's just killing me."

Sora took a deep breath, and pulled back for a moment. All of them at one time or another had run into this problem, though it apparently was bothering Mimi more than the rest of them. They _were _still children, for all practical purposes, but had been through events that had matured them rather rapidly. Even the cares of most of their older classmates at their respective schools now seemed juvenile after what they had all been through, and Mimi was right: they at least had each other. When she was away, she had no one to be there for her.

Sora held her friend at arm's length. "Oh Mimi, I'm sorry. Truly sorry. I should have thought about that before I actually said anything. I know how hard it must be for you"

The younger girl sniffed. "And you've got Matt _and _Tai. I can't even find someone that's suitable to go out on a date with back home. The boys are as bad as the girls… they're all just so _childish_. I've got nothing in common with any of them, and I can't even think about forming that kind of attachment with someone that I can't even be friends with first..."

Sora stared at her, somewhat taken aback. Even if unintentional, that passing comment had been the most profound piece of advice that she had been given since she had started trying to make her decision. All the emotions that she'd been experiencing quite suddenly made perfect sense to the older girl. "Thanks. Thanks a lot, Mimi. That's the most help that I've gotten in a long time."

"What?"

*****

"What's taking them so long in there?" asked Izzy. T.K., Kari and Joe had all arrived by this time, and according to the explanation of Tai and Matt, Sora and Mimi had been alone in the room for nearly two hours.

T.K. shrugged. "Who can tell with girls?" Then, "Ow!" as Kari cuffed him lightly on shoulder.

"Maybe she's waiting for an apology," Joe suggested bluntly, glancing over at Matt and Tai. The two had attempted a stammering explanation of exactly what had happened earlier, though both had been blushing darkly the entire time.

Tai and Matt looked at one another and gave a short, nervous laugh. "Well?" the blond boy asked.

Tai sighed and came to his feet, moving slowly towards Sora's room while seemingly ready to bolt if she should come after him again. Lightly he rapped his fingertips across the door. "Ah, S... Sora?" he said hesitantly, then paused and glanced back over his shoulder at the others. When no answer was forthcoming, he continued. "Listen. Matt and I... well, we just wanted to say that we're sorry about what happened earlier. I... I mean, with the towel and everything…"

The door opened and Sora stepped out, a triumphantly smiling Mimi trailing behind her. "I know, Tai," she said simply and with a smile. A single long braid hung on the side of her head, and she had dressed in what Tai assumed was the most elegant casual clothing that she had. Joe's eyebrows raised slightly. "Gee. Suddenly I feel kind of underdressed."

The party got underway as most of their gatherings usually did, with extended conversation about their adventures in the "other" world and what might be happening there right now. And, more importantly, if it might ever be possible to get back. Izzy had some thoughts on that latter topic. Sora, with Mimi's permission, explained what was happening with the younger girl back in her new homeland, and each of the others made a special point during the day of getting together with her and explaining how they all had run into similar feelings at one point or another.

At the insistence of the other three, Tai, Matt, Sora, T.K. and Kari again went over what had happened to them on their camping trip half a year ago. Mimi, who had still not heard the story from those who had actually been there listened intently, and along with the rest wondered what had happened to the dark angels after Kari and T.K. had driven them away.

Then Sora stood up. Mimi looked at her with hopeful eyes, but Sora seemed to shake her head at the other girl. "Who wants something to eat?"

"Cake?" asked T.K. hopefully, drawing a smile from Kari.

Sora grinned at the younger boy as well. "Later," she said apologetically. "Mom left some real food in the oven for when we got hungry."

The meal was relatively uneventful, with the exception of the giggling fit that overcame everyone when T.K. and Kari started trying to force-feed one another the gelatin dessert. "They really are _so _cute together!" Mimi whispered to Sora.

After the meal (and Tai's whimpering confession that he had probably eaten much more than was good for him) Sora asked if everyone was ready for the cake.

"Sora!" Mimi whined, obviously anxious to move on to other things.

But it just wasn't time, the older girl knew. It wasn't right yet. "Um… Ice cream?" Sora amended.

Kari went to Sora's side and took her by the hand. "How about the presents now?" she suggested.

Sora smiled gratefully. "Good… good idea."

Mimi folded her arms across her chest in a huff, then thought better of it and pulled a carefully wrapped package out from under the table and presented it to their host. "Happy birthday, Sora," she said, feigning cheerfulness but obviously quite impatient to witness the emotional conclusion that was about to take place.

The older girl unwrapped it slowly, and opened the small box to reveal a small, silver hair clip. Just like one that she would need now that Mimi had put the braid in... her... hair… _"Mimi!"_

"Okay, okay," the other confessed, grinning ever-so-slightly. "I'd already made up my mind to do something with your hair. I just couldn't stand to see it so plain anymore. Your fit just gave us an opportunity to talk while I did it."

"Izzy, this is lovely," Sora breathed, holding the objected he'd just given her up to her eye. It was an intricate and very cleverly designed prism, which seemed to catch the fading sunlight and send colored beams of it shining everywhere. "Thank you so much."

Joe's gift was a book, entitled _'101 of History's Greatest Love Poems and Sonnets'_. Seven pairs of eyes turned as one and blinked in surprise at the young man, who cleared his throat nervously in response. "What? It's not for _me_..."

"These were kind of meant to go together," said Kari, as both she and T.K. offered their packages to the older girl. The paper wrapping around each of the small objects suggested delicacy, so Sora took care as she opened each of them. The gifts were a pair of sculpted crystalline doves whose wings, when turned to face each other, formed the shape of a heart between them.

Matt went behind the couch and retrieved his package, much larger than the others, and offered it to the girl. Sora looked quizzical as she pulled the wrapping from the gift… "Oh, Matt-" she exhaled, her breath catching in her throat.

It was a painted portrait of her holding her friend Biyoman in her lap. The detail was exquisite, and the frame and detail of the painting made it somewhat obvious that the boy had not spared any expense in shopping for her. But then she frowned. She hadn't ever posed for such a picture…

"I…I had it done from memory," Matt said, his cheeks reddening somewhat. "The guy who did it for me was pretty fussy about it, but I think it turned out okay in the end."

"Okay? Matt this is unbelievable. The detail, the colors… it's extraordinary. Thank you."

"I think I'll have to give you mine a little later," said Tai hesitantly, as if in apology. "It kind of requires an explanation."

There were tears of joy in Sora's eyes as she nodded, and stood up. "Thank you all," she said, smiling at each of them in turn. "You're all the best group of friends that anyone could ask for. I really don't deserve all of you."

Then there was a momentary, awkward silence. Mimi stared pointedly at the older girl and gave a small motion with her head. Sora sighed, knowing that she couldn't put this off any longer. "M… Matt? Can I see you in my bedroom… for a sec?"

The blond boy nodded, and flashed a triumphant grin at the others as he followed the girl into her room. All but Tai returned the smile.

"Well, I guess that leaves me to cut the cake," Mimi said.

*****

"Remember Tai, you promised," his younger sister chided the boy, who had refused all offers of cake or conversation since Matt and Sora had retired almost an hour ago.

"I still don't see why they have to take so long. I can deal with it, but if they're just going to make out while the rest of us are still here-"

"Tai?" Matt had a wide grin on his face, so wide that Tai had to resist the impulse to slap it off of there. "Your turn," he said, motioning towards the room that he had just left.

The dark-haired boy's eyes were dark and his teeth clenched tightly together, but he straightened his back and marched steadfastly into the room. He was determined that his friends _not _see him broken by this. He might cry a river of tears in private, but his pride would remain intact.

Sora was sitting in her bed, her head lowered and tears evidently staining her shirt as the boy closed the door behind him. The floral scent of her perfume lingered in the air, and Tai stopped for a moment to allow it to hold him in its embrace. He never wanted to let go of that moment, despite what she was going to say to him. When several minutes passed without the girl speaking, he cleared his throat gently. "S... Sora?" He swallowed deeply, but still couldn't make the lump in his throat go away. "Listen, I know I made a promise to you about this, and I'll keep it... but I never promised that I could--"

The girl's head bowed even lower. "Tai... stop. It's you."

The words stunned him for a moment, daring him to believe that they meant what he thought they meant. "H…huh?" he stammered.

She arose and wiped the tears out of her eyes with a sleeve. "That doesn't mean that what I feel for Matt has lessened any, but… it's just not the same thing that I feel for you. It took me a long time, longer than it should have for me to see it, Tai, but it _is_ you. It... it's _always _been you…"

The lump was back in his throat, and in a moment, the girl was in his arms. A feeling like a warm, gentle wave caressed his skin. "If it's always been me, then why--"

She looked up into his dark eyes. "I thought that what we had would be ruined if I fell in love with you, so I guess I tried to bury the love underneath the friendship… at least that's what your sister tried to tell me. I really didn't understand what she was saying until Mimi put it another way. And so somewhere along the way I got the friendship and the love confused, until what I felt for you was kind of like what I felt for Matt. But what I _do _feel for you is really nothing like what I feel for any of the others. Please forgive me for taking so long to figure it out."

"Forgive you?" he answered, choking on a sob. "Sora, I love you..." His voice was fervent but his lips gentle as he bent down to kiss her; not as before when they had played at dating, and not in friendship as he had when he first made his confession of love. No, the kiss that he offered now was one truly born out of commitment and passion.

They broke off the kiss after a while but still he hugged her tightly to his chest, as if he would draw her into himself. The blissful feeling could not be made more perfect. Unless perhaps…

"Oh, and happy birthday," he said to her, reaching into a pocket and pulling out a small envelope.

She opened the proffered package, then her eyes went blank. "The park? The horse and carriage ride through the park?" The tickets, she knew, were not at all inexpensive, and were usually cost prohibitive except for particularly special occasions. Several times she had heard that graduating couples from the high school had gotten engaged on the trip. "I thought you weren't sure that I was going to pick you?" she asked teasingly.

He looked almost embarrassed. "Hence the explanation. If these had been for you and Matt, I just would have wanted to let you know what a great guy you were getting."

"He said pretty much the same thing."

"Should we go out and see the others? You might finally be able to get Mimi off of your back."

"In a second," she said, her arms still around his neck. She drew him down towards her for another kiss.

"Or a few seconds," he murmured against her lips.

It was actually several minutes before the couple emerged from the room to the knowing smiles of their friends. Well, all except for…

"Matt," said Tai, looking around.

T.K. stepped forward to speak for his brother. "He'll be okay, Tai. He was ready for this, and really is happy for both of you. He just wanted some time to himself for a while. Don't worry."

"About time," Kari said to the two as the boy's arm and looked at the older girl.

"You knew all the time," Sora nodded, smiling at the other. "I guess this time it was _me _that didn't understand what _you _were talking about. How did you know?"

Kari coughed, looking somewhat sheepish. "Well, actually… you kind of…rather tend to…talk in your sleep."

T.K. looked at her, disappointed. "Oh, and all this time I though you had some wonderful feminine insight into the whole thing." He turned his head to the side, rolling his eyes and lowering his voice. "Talks in her sleep..."

The group got a big laugh at that, and gathered around to wish their congratulations to the new couple. "Now, about the rest of that cake…" Tai said.


End file.
